Downfall of us All
by Jokerang
Summary: The Governor is back and out for blood. Daryl finds friendship and love in the one person he least expects. Rick becomes more stressed as the ante is upped and the risks increase for everyone. Battles loom ahead, though no one knows when. Daryl/Beth along with an escalating war between Rick and the Governor.
1. Prolouge

The Governor looked out into the night sky.

He had to admit: Mother Nature could provide an amazing spectacle when it wanted to. The stars, the moon, and all the rest seemed to shine themselves onto him. He took a moment to close the one good eye and reflect on the past month.

Things had started going to shit when the army just... refused to fight on the side of a road. He had to be honest with himself, he may have lost his cool killing all those pathetic people from Woodbury. But it was something that needed to be done. They were cowards and fools who had somehow broken the hold he once had over them all for an entire winter. Only Martinez, Shumpert, and Allen were allowed to live. The first two were in the Governor's car with him fleeing the prison, but Allen was the only person out of the rest to voice an opinion to go back and take out Rick's group. After an uneasy standoff with the man, the Governor convinced Allen that the others deserved to die and that Allen would be allowed vengeance against his son's killers. Besides, the man's anger could be turned into a useful weapon later, when good people were now hard to find in the world they lived in. After he was cracked, the Governor finished up the job and they left the scene of the crime.

Afterwards, the four drove for miles and miles throughout Georgia, looking for another group to submit to their authority. There was no point in going back to Woodbury, all that remained of the place consisted of women, children, and old folks - hardly the people to fight and die. Over the next few weeks, the four encountered about twenty or so survivors - some in pairs, some alone, and one group of seven. All of these people were scared and desperate, but armed and survivalists. What they needed, and what they got, was a forceful leader who could restore hope. That leader could only be the Governor. Now, in a supermarket cleared out of walkers, the Governor and his new found allies could rest for now. But there would be no endless reprisal.

Rick, Michonne, and all the others in that prison needed to die. Espically that bitch who killed his daughter and stabbed out his eye. Even if it took weeks, they would burn. And burn. And burn.

For now though, they would go and gather more weapons, supplies, and warm bodies needed for the assault. After sending Shumpert and two others to collect walkers for another herd, the Governor went into a private room that appeared to once have been the manager's office. The room still smelled of walker blood and pure shit. Martinez was waiting for him, reclining in a chair.

"Well, what do you have to report back to me?" the Governor asked his second in command and the closest thing he had to a friend after killing Milton. Martinez had just got back from investigating a fortified town run by military personal near the Georgia/Alabama border

Martinez gave the biggest grin that Phillip had ever seen. Phillip wondered if Satan had ever emerged from Hell just to show the man how to smile.

"We hit the jackpot, baby!"

"Explain. How do you know they won't back-stab us one day?" asked the Governor, distrustfully.

_Well, you're one to talk about backstabbing_, thought Martinez. _You killed all your own troops because they didn't want to follow your orders exactly to the tiniest detail. Shumpert, Allen and I only stayed with your ass because any other option meant likely death for us. _But there was no need to tell that to the Governor, who was, Martinez had figured, the coldest bastard to walk the planet. Instead, he told about the golden discovery.

"The commander of the fort turned out to be an old high school friend. Name's Jeremy Hanson. He'll work something out with us, as long as he gets to meet and negotiate with you. You're the actual leader here, after all."

"What about his arsenal and troops?"

"They number over a hundred. Most were former Marines, but a few are friends and family. Had at least one armored personal carrier, and some RPGs. Already have rifles and submachine guns. Well trained and well fed. They'll make an excellent new army for us."

The Governor got up and patted Martinez on the back. This was indeed the jackpot.

"The two of us leave tomorrow. I think fate is in our hands now, buddy."

Having finished speaking those words, the Governor went back outside to enjoy the nighttime sky. With him he brought a sense of what he was planning and a desire to watch the prison and it's inhabitants rot away, crushed by the expansive dream he was putting the gears in place in in his mind.

**AN:**

**This story takes place a month after the Season 3 finale, "Welcome to the Tombs". Only difference from the show as of now is that Allen is not killed.**

**The main POV will be Daryl's, with other characters such as Rick and the Governor having occasional POVs.**

**I know this prologue is short, but trust me, I've got more cooking. I promise you it will be longer and better.**

**I have some OCs in mind. If you want to appear in a cameo, leave the following in a review:**

**Name:**

**Age:**

**Weapons:**

**Appearance:**


	2. Well, that's Progress

**Disclaimer: Quite obviously, I do not own the Walking Dead or A Day to Remember. Review, follow, and favorite, I will be looking at the reviews for ideas and constructive criticism. OCs are still available. **

_"You won't find me in the same spot believe me I could never stop, my life's turned upside down..."_

Beth was surprised to find Homesick among the oddities collected by Glenn and Rick on their latest run. In addition to the regular supplies, the two of them had brought back a CD player and quite a number discs to play on it. Most of them were genres suited to Beth's tastes of music, but this last CD was a mystery. Perhaps someone had requested it for themselves. Well, they would get it. Just after she examined it and the music it had in it. On her second go around on this song, she felt she was getting the catch of the lyrics of the chorus.

_"Meet me out past the train tracks I'm leavin' and not coming back, you're right and I was wrong, this town will be-"_

Beth's voice was interrupted by another, very recognizable Southern drawl that completed the chorus.

_"-the downfall of us all." _

Beth looked up. Only one man kept his facial hair like that and always carried a crossbow. Daryl Dixon.

"Jesus, you could have killed me," she remarked in a nervous tone of voice.

"Sorry," replied Daryl. It just happened that you were singing one of my favorite songs for just a couple of years ago."

"You mean-" Beth suddenly realized that the assumption that was biting at her. "You're the one that requested Rick get this on his last run?"

"Yep. What's the point of life if you don't have the things that make it enjoyable? Music, for starters." Daryl knew where he was going with this, and expected Beth to say what he wanted to say.

"If nothing else, you'll always have me and my voice to keep you entertained."

"Yeah, I already know that yo voice is pretty and all that, it's just that-" Daryl could feel the uneasiness creeping in his stomach and abdomen as he spoke. He tapped on of the bunk beds repetitively.

'Well, go on." Beth gave Daryl that blush and awkward smile that Daryl had seen several times before. Usually it was Carl telling some joke or other tall tale to impress her. He couldn't blame the kid, now that he was experiencing it himself.

"it's just that... you can sing this album just as well as you can anything else that you sing." _There,_ Daryl thought. _I've given the girl another compliment._ Maybe the ol'Dixon charm wasn't exclusive to Merle alone. Maybe he had it too, all along, just waiting for a chance.

"Thank you." Beth's acknowledgment was genuine and affectionate. Then she put on a more playful smile. "Maybe you'd like to sing? I'm sure you have your own voice in you as well."

Daryl was amused. This girl wanted to teach _him_? "Blondie, you know I've got more important things to do than be a choir boy. I gotta hunt, kill walkers, and provide for another dozen people that once wished me dead." The last chore of his put on a frown on Daryl's face. Ever since Rick had decided to bring in those people from Woodbury, food supplies were diminishing faster than ever before. The daily supply runs that Rick, Daryl, Glenn, and Michonne went on barely filled up everyone and only increased the risk that one day, one of them would get bitten or eaten by walkers. Hershel was planning a small farm with the help of some of the elders from Woodbury, but it would be months before anything of use would pop up out of the ground.

Beth was appalled by Daryl's apparent lack of empathy. "What else was there to do? We couldn't just leave them they defenseless, ready to die at the hands of walkers after their so-called leader massacred their friends and family."

"But-" Daryl tried to talk some sense into her, but soon realized by the stance Beth was taking, with a no-nonsense look on here face and arms crossed on her chest, arguing with her was a lost cause. Best to try and make up, hard as it was. " I dunno what we're going to do with them. I really just don't see what."

"I'll pray for an answer," said Beth. "You sure you still don't want to sing with me?"

"Only if I get to be your personal trainer during practice in a couple hours."

Beth got up and picked up the knife and handgun she was allotted for walker killing practice. "Deal." She turned to Daryl. "Now, if you'll excuse me, there's a baby that needs feeding."

As she got up and went to where Judith was in her crib, Carol came up to Daryl and asked for a walk. He agreed. As they went around the perimeter, Carol had a big grin on her face and said "Well well well, it looks like old Daryl Dixon is attracted to someone."

Daryl got defensive. "I am NOT in love with that girl!"

Carol laughed. "It's too obvious. You took your time answering her questions and even agreed with her on an issue we both know is pissing you off."

"Well, it is."

"And if you fully believe the Woodbury people need to go, how come you let someone like Beth talk you down so quick?"

Daryl got back on the defensive. "There is no way I could ever make that girl fall for me. She's half my age, and the moment Hershel finds out all about it he'll be kicking my ass as fast as he can on crutches with one leg."

Carol thought about what to tell Daryl, then replied "Take it slow is all I'm saying. Just do things for her, keep training her, and in time even Hershel and Maggie will come to terms with it. The world we live in doesn't allow much time for later; all you have is now."

With that Carol began to leave Daryl. Not a second later a lone walker rattled the chain-link fence, startling both of them. Daryl took out his knife and stabbed it in the eye. As the walker fell to the ground, Daryl commented "Not a difficult thing to do, is it?"

"Depends on what that 'difficult thing' is," said Carol.

As she walked off, Daryl thought about it. He had to admit that Beth was really cute, with that voice, smile, and face. Maybe he would take Carol's advice and start interacting with her more, maybe become friends.

But lovers? No, never. Not going to happen.

* * *

"Keep your aim nice and steady. You don't want to aim too high or too low."

Beth sighed. By Daryl standards, he was going easy on her. Not so with the others. Only a few days after taking the Woodbury people in, Rick, announced that he would be starting a training session for anyone who was fit enough to kill walkers but didn't have the experience. "In light of the threat of both a potential herd and the Governor coming back, we need to have everyone who is capable of doing so trained to hunt and kill. Our survival could depend on it," said Rick to everyone.

On that day, Beth knew she was going to end up at it sooner or later. She knew a little about guns and such but didn't really know what to do in a combat situation. Fortunately, Daryl had taken her plight and was now making sure she got special attention. This current day, While Rick, Carl, and Sasha taught the Woodbury kids how to use knifes and other sharp objects, Daryl took Beth to the makeshift shooting range to... well, work on just about everything there was to with guns. Finally, Daryl got the gun-arm positioning fixed up and told her to aim and fire.

She took a deep breath and aimed at one of the green bottles.

And she fired, her arms shaking the whole way.

And missed.

Daryl sighed. Beth obviously didn't have the heart for this right now. However, he decided to keep on trying with her.

"Girlie, you got to keep yourself calm You think the Governor or the walkers give a shit if you're scared of them? No. Go again, and this time get yourself together and just focus."

Beth let off an angry sigh Her failure to hit the target seemed to be a metaphor for life as it was now. Moving about endlessly, searching for answers that would never be found. Life seemed so pointless and futile sometimes. _Wait, what?_ thought Beth. She _could_ do this. She had a gun and one of the group's best shootes offering her personal help. It was possible. She just had to try.

Taking careful aim, she lined up the next bottle in her sights, and fired again.

This time, the bottle shattered into a hundred tiny pieces. Beth smiled, and let out a sigh of relief. She had done it.

"Told ya you were capable of it," said Daryl. Beth took the time to absorb his features again: unshaven but somewhat well-kept facial hair, powerful muscles built from a year of survival tactics, a slim, well built body, and piercing blue eyes that reminded her of her own. In a way, he seemed like a very handsome man, if anyone nowadays could fit under that category.

Then Rick called Daryl's name. He was apparently needed for something. Probably another run somewhere.

"Listen, I'll get back to you later. Rick needs my help right now."

"You'll come back for your singing lessons soon, right? You promised."

Daryl's stomach did flipflops inside of him.

"Uhh... yeah, sure, whatever you say."

"Thanks." Beth gave Daryl a semi-hug and went back inside the prison. Daryl smiled to himself and thought _well, that's progress_ as he went to see the plan of Rick's latest run.


	3. Her First Run

Rick didn't know what to think of this.

At the last group meeting, Carol had came in and told Rick that Judith's baby food supply was running low again. Sighing a stress filled sigh, he made a new announcement.

"I'm going to need a second pair of people to go out and collect a month's worth of baby food and supplies. Usual location, just get in, find what you need and get out ASAP."

Rick wasn't surprised when Daryl was the first to volunteer to fend for Judith. He had grown quite attached to the infant, dubbed the 'little asskicker', since he first laid eyes on her. It was the one thing guaranteed to bring out the soft side of the otherwise cold and calculating hunter. He could be sent on this run; it would be both beneficial to both him and the baby. What did surprise him, along with Hershel, Maggie, and Carl, was that Daryl insisted that Beth come along with him. The way she calmly heard Daryl's proposition indicated that she had obviously talked with the man beforehand and was wanting to go with him.

"Beth, I don't know what to say to you. I know you're very watchful of Judith and would know what's best for her, but I don't want to risk losing you out there. I don't know if you're ready and-"

"Like hell she's ready," snapped Daryl. "The girl asked me for a little extra training over the past week. She needs experience anyhow. And I'm not very knowledgeable on baby food and other crap little asskicker needs to live. Pretty sure she can fill me in on that," he said, pointing a finger to Beth.

"I still don't know." Rick paced for a few second before making up his mind. "Hershel, she's your daughter. What's your say on her going on a run?"

Like Rick, Hershel took a few seconds to think it over. Then he spoke, "Beth, you're eighteen years old now. In the old world, you would have been considered an adult. Now, I guess you still are. I'm letting you go with Daryl because I trust him with your life, but please, for my sake as well as yours, don't do anything stupid out there."

"Don't worry Daddy, I'll be fine." Beth went to her father and kissed his forehead lightly.

"Beth's safe with me. I'd die defending her, just like anyone else here," added Daryl.

Maggie was on the verge of speaking up, as to protest the decision, but stern looks from both Rick and Daryl convinced her that their minds were stuck on it. They were the effective leader and second in command, and their decisions were usually final.

Having settled that matter, Rick took off to talk with one of the Woodbury elders. It seemed that their worries and issues had close to no end. After that, he had to decide what to do with what appeared to be a 19 or 20 year old, but clearly unafraid and eager to survive.

* * *

**Beth POV**

So it was all said and done. Daryl proved true to his word and got me on my first run. However, it seemed there was more than just baby food involved here.

I really wasn't sure what Daryl wanted from me.

He was a decent person, but not the first pick for a date. Not mine. Then again, what options did I have? It was just him, Rick, and Carl in the single men department. pretty much.

Rick was out of the question. Lori's death not too long ago had taken it's toll on his mental health, and he seemed intent on remaining a widower for the rest of his life. Then there was Carl. He was the closest to me agewise, and acted like he was ten years older than he really was but I just didn't see him as attractive. He was the only kid, and it would take years for him to become an attractive person. And when death was at you're doorstep no one had the luxury that was time anymore. This left Daryl.

I guess it was my hormones. Puberty and all that. Half of me was wanting to punch Daryl for all his antics and foul tongue, but the other half was whispering in my hear to give him a chance. In his own ways he could be charming, and the ways he treated Carl almost as his own child or the mollycoddling he gave Judith proved he did indeed have a soft side underneath the mask of ruthlessness he always had on.

Looking out the window, and taking in the endless Georgia forests, I realized I wanted to talk to someone, like I could with my friends before the walkers came. But my options were pretty limited. Maggie would storm off in a minute's instance and immediately confront Daryl. Carol seemed like a better option; she and I had grown close and her friendship with Daryl was even closer. But I couldn't control her telling Daddy or Maggie about anything. If either of them knew, then would show Daryl just how protective they were of the family's little angel.

But the fact was, I hadn't been an angel or belle for a long time. Those days were over, and you just had to make the most of what life threw at you. Even if it was a redneck hunter who could have been your dad.

I guess talking to him was the only option right now, in the car.

* * *

**Daryl POV**

"Daryl, can I ask you something?"

I was driving off to some pissy hot little town with a supermarket when Beth ask her first question the whole car ride.

"Yeah?"

"How'd you get to be so good with a crossbow? And why do you prefer it over a regular gun?"

I looked at her like she was a village idiot trying to tell me how to take my first baby steps.

"Girl, the crossbow has been my best friend since I was ten years old. Even Merle had to rival it for it's worth to me. That thing has gotten me out of trouble too many times in life. Some of them are so sad I don't even want to remember."

Beth immediately had a downcast look on her. What a sweetheart, as Merle would have described it. "May I ask what it was?"

I decided to tell her. This tale I usually didn't tell anyone, and if someone asked I usually told them to go preform some very unconformable sexual acts. But seeing the innocent and concerned look of Beth's face, combined with the fact there was nothing else to entertain both of us, I decided to go ahead and recall the sad story.

"I was ten," I told her. "Just minding my own business when I tripped on something. Dunno what the hell it was, but it made me hit a bottle of whiskey and threw to to the floor, shattering the bottle and spilling all the contents. My old man came in, drunk and angry as hell. Whipped out his knife and slashed me across the chest. It's just one of many I got from that bastard over twelve years."

"I'm so sorry."

"Don't be. After that, I ran off to what you might call a garage. My mom and Merle weren't there to stand in my dad's way that time; she was passed out at some other man's house and my brother was also away. He hated the old man even more than I did. Anyways, in this shack I call a garage I searched for the first thing I could use to defend myself. As luck would have it, a loaded crossbow happened to be that thing. I could use it, but how well was tested when my dad came in, roaring even worse than a walker. Or five of them, for that matter."

"Did you...?" Beth was obviously anticipating the worst. Everyone who he'd told this story to did.

"Naw. He made a move on me and I fired. Not at him, but it did pierce the wall just behind him. Stunned him for a minute, and then he just threw the knife at me. had to duck for cover. After that, he said something about how much of a little bitch I was for not aiming at him and then he just left. Dried up my tears for that shit a long time ago. That's one of the reasons you should value your own dad. He's everything that mine was not, and Rick, I, or anyone else would die keeping him safe."

"Well, he can be difficult sometimes. And he's kind of overprotective..." Beth seemed ready to fight with me, but I could tell she was fighting back tears. Dunno if they were in response to my story, the thought of losing Hershel, or most likely both.

"Hey. I'd rather have that then everything that me and Merle went through in our childhoods. I know you're Hershel's youngest and the one he looks out for but still." I pulled up in front of the door of the supermarket and scanned for stray walkers. Good, I didn't see any. As Beth and I got out, I told her, "Try and not to get you killed. I promised him that much."

She grinned. "I'll be safe. You think I'd let myself die a virgin?" She gave me an almost flirtatious wink.

I almost dropped my jaw then and there, but kept my cool. Then something Merle told me entered my mind.

"_Do you even possess a pair of balls, little brother? Are they even attached?_"

Merle had been talking with him about his relations with Rick and Glenn at the time, but Beth's words made him realize they applied to more.

_Yes, big brother, they are indeed attached. I'll show you. _The two of them scanned the entrance to the supermarket, then entered. Judith was waiting.

* * *

Not five minutes after the two of them entered the building did a military style Jeep pull up next to the car.

Three men got out of the Jeep. Previously in life, they had been Army Rangers, serving the country and President. But when the world went to shit, they had been in Fort Benning, and had helped clear the base of zombies, walkers, whatever you wanted to call those things that reanimated and fed on human flesh. A thriving community in the post-apocalyptic world, Fort Benning had, for the past year, shut itself off to the outside world, focusing on itself. But not any longer.

A radio on one of the men cracked. "Augustus Four Alpha, have you reached the location?"

The leader, who had the radio, replied, "Yes sir. And it looks like that some of them are here as well. Don't know what for."

"It doesn't matter," replied the emotionless voice of Major Hanson. "Your orders are to kill them. I don't care how. We're doing this Phillip man and my friend a favor. You copy?"

"Roger that," said the patrol leader, as the three of them began their hunt.

**AN:**

**So there's our first cliffhanger. Dun Dun Dunnnnnn...**

**As always, review, favorite, and follow. I write this for you guys, the fans.** **Next chapter soon.**

**-Jokerang**


	4. Fistfights

**Daryl POV**

"Well, I think we've got everything we need," said Beth as she filled a backpack with the last of a certain Gerber food brand.

"Kay. Think we're ready to-"

I was cut short but several distinctly male voices, accompanied with the all too familiar noise of a rifle cocking.

"Beth, keep your head low and don't make a move or sound. I think we have company." She did, nervous and uneasy, for she could tell that this was a very serious matter.

Doing my best to remain silent, I caught a glimpse of what appeared to be two army soldiers, systematically going down each row of this supermarket's aisles. Each looked stern and was armed with an MP5 submachine gun. I thought I could do some talkin' till I heard one of them saying "So the one he wants dead the most is some black woman with a katana, eh?"

I froze. This was very, very bad. The Governor now had at least two more men, possibly more, to send out on manhunts for Rick, Michonne, and the rest of us. What was supposed to be a simple supply run, with only walkers to worry about, was now a risky game of freedom and imprisonment, or, more likely, death. Then again, they _were_ living in a prison.

Seeing the soldiers put down their guns to take some beer and other drinks for themselves, I quickly formulated a plan.

"Beth, listen to me," I said in the quietest voice I could. " There are two guys in here sent by the Governor in the building right now. They just put down their guns, and I'm going to go over there and try to take um out."

"You mean..."

"Yes, I do mean kill." The gravity of situation was the only thing keeping Beth from screaming in protest. "It's the only way at least one of us, or maybe both if we're lucky, are getting out of here. While I fight them, you run out the back entrance." I pointed to a half opened door that led to a cargo holding area or whatever. "You take the baby food and head out for the car. If I'm not out in about five minutes or so, you use the car to get the hell out of here. Judith needs that more than me."

"But what if..." Beth gave me that sweet and innocent, but deeply concerned look that was all too familiar to me.

_Well, I want to tell you... _Daryl considered telling her how he really felt. But she might just laugh it off. And right now, every second counted in a game of life and death.

So instead I told her, "You better not die a virgin now," giving her a grin.

Thankfully, she returned it. "Promised you that much." She gave me a quick kiss on the cheek and ran off towards the back of the building. With that taken care of, I headed sneakily to the two soldiers on an unofficial break. Before the first of them could reach for his gun, I grabbed him from the back and hauled his ass into the nearest aisle, sending whatever it was flying along with him.

* * *

**Beth POV**

Just ten minutes ago it had been causal flirting with the man assigned on this seemingly harmless run. Now it was a risky shot at getting her out while Daryl did all he could to distract the Governor's men.

Clearing this storage space was easy enough, most likely because not a single walker was to be found. Glenn and Rick had done a really good job of securing it while they here. Carefully opening up the door that led to the outside, she found herself with quite a nasty surprise.

It was a walker looking straight at her. But before she had time to pull out her sidearm or even scream out, the walker took a bullet and fell down to the left side, it's brains and other mush on the gravel of the outside ramp. It looked clearly dead.

Beth made an attempt to kick the thing to see if it was dead. She'd rarely had to deal with the walkers, and even after a year of living to survive being eaten by them they still grossed her out big time. She was finally convinced it wouldn't come back from the dead and was about to investigate where the shot had been fired from when a voice said to her in an intimidating tone, "Don't move and turn around now."

Shocked, she complied, to see the man who had killed that walker. Like the men inside the supermarket, he too was of clearly military background, with cameo and an M4 pointed at her chest. She froze in terror. _This is very bad_, she thought. Neither her nor Daryl had anticipated a guard waiting outside just in case they tried to slip out the back door. Hopefully, she could live long enough not to regret the decision.

"Well, well, well, if it isn't one of those prison brats," the soldier said whit a malicious look on his face. He could tell he was sizing her up; Beth knew the type from her high school days. This man was a predator, and one that was armed with a gun and clearly not afraid to use it.

"A-Are you going to kill me?" asked Beth, her voice trembling. While she said this, she was formulating a ruse to get herself out of this situation. In any other circumstance, she would have let someone else with more fighting skill deal with this man, but given the lack of Daryl, she would have to make do with her own brains.

"Nah," replied the soldier. "This guy named the Governor or some shit wanted all y'all folks from the prison all dead save for some bitch with a katana and a sheriff leading y'all. But you're just too cute to let go of so easily. Maybe I''ll take you back to Benning and let the real men show you how to give ya some action, huh?"

_Well, I was thinking about losing my virginity just five minutes ago, but not to this creep. _"Maybe, but you work for the Governor? A man who killed his own followers in cold blood? Then I guess you and all your friends are a bunch of lame-brained dogs." She didn't know were she was getting the courage to stand up to this monster but she reckoned if she was going to die, she might as well go out fighting. Besides, her plan needed this creep roused up and very angry.

And angry he was. Lifting up his rifle, he sharpened his tone and said, "Take off your clothes right now." "I prefer my my clothes on my back, thank you very much," replied Beth.

"Then I'll guess I'll just have to shoot you, then."

"I thought you wanted to take me alive."

"I am. I'm going to shoot you in the leg." He pointed his rifle down towards her legs. "You have really nice legs. That's just too bad-"

WHAM! Beth brought her right foot and hit the man in the groin as hard as she could. It was enough to make him drop his rifle and grab his stomach, clearly in much pain.

As she grabbed his rifle, the man began to panic. "Easy, girl," he purred as she lifted the rifle butt above his head.

She didn't go easy on him at all. A blow to the temple left him face flat on the ground, knocked out cold. At that moment she noticed a couple of walkers in the parking lot. _His problem_, thought Beth as she proceeded to rush to the car, load the goods in the trunk, and headed back in the way she came to check on Daryl. If she could take out a former Army soldier, he could easily take on two.

* * *

**Daryl POV**

Just my luck. I threw one of them into an aisle, only to get the other one grabbing me by the neck. He was pulling my neck as hard as he damn well could, trying to give his buddy a chance to get up and then maybe the two of them could take me down once and for all. I wasn't going to let that happen anytime soon. Using all my might, I lifted the bastard up as high as I well could and threw him off of me, his head hitting the floor before the rest of him would. That was the least of my troubles, though.

The original guy, the one I'd slammed into canned food and bottled drinks, threw himself at me with all the strength he could muster up then and there. I'd braced myself, but Christ, that man could slam you like a rhino. I struggle, but eventually he was making my feet lose traction. I could feel him driving me backwards. He shove me along, until we reached and crashed into the back wall. Kitchen supplies and other home decor stuff shattered and went flying in our wake. Getting back o my feet, I realized he had taken the greater share of the burden of slamming into a wall. I seized the opportunity, punching and kicking him. As he kept trying and failed to get back up, I taunted and interrogated him at the same time.

"You know just you've pissed off, sunshine? Well, if you don't, that's a goddamn shame. Who sent you on this little raid, by the way? Did that Governor bastard boss you around? Was it that spic Martinez?"

"It doesn't matter," answered the man before he managed to swirl his leg around and trip me. I fell pretty hard, and I could have sworn that I broke a rib or two in the process.

Now he was getting up. I knew that if I didn't do something soon, he was gonna make me wish I'd never pissed him off. Looking around, I saw a baseball bat within my field of vision, but not exactly within his. Backing away from the bastard, who'd seemed intent on just going slow with his feet and taking his time making me suffer, I got myself to where the bats were and challenged him with my words. "I bet your gay boyfriend over in aisle six sucks dick and hits harder than you!"

That did the trick. Now really pissed off, the man charged at me, growling an indistinguishable growl or roar... and then, with all the swinging room that I had, I took the baseball bat and swung it as hard as I could into the guy's face. The hit was hard enough to draw blood, and he went down really fast. He didn't get up.

_Holy shit_, I thought to myself. I checked for a heartbeat or breathing. I found no signs of either. He was uncompromisingly dead.

Time to clean up back in aisle six. I found the second soldier struggling to pull himself together. I grabbed him by the neck and roared at him, "Give me one good reason not to snap your neck right now."

"P-Please, I'm not the one who wanted to go! Our boss made us; we're divided on whether to help this Governor guy or not!" He was clearly shaken, and didn't want to die. Maybe he was scared of death.

"That's lovely, but I still don't see why I should let you live."

"I-I'm a medic! I can help you! I'll defect! Just don't kill me!" As I looked into his eyes, I realized he was maybe twenty-five or so. He was also very, very nervous and terrified.

I thought about it. I was NOT going to let this guy become another Randall, but he was a medic, and all we had at the prison was Hershel, Carol, one of the doctors from Woodbury, and that was it. Besides, this guys was my only chance of knowing what the Governor was up to and what he had planned for his next move.

"Fine," I said. "You're coming with me. We need doctors. But ONE bad move, and I'm throwing you out to the walkers. Understand?"

He gave a weak nod. Just then Beth walked in, looking disheveled, and we gave each other a strong hug. After being at the brink of death, we needed it more than ever. "Any complications?" I asked her.

"Well, there was this one creeper staying outside in case we tried to go out that way, but a kick to the balls and a blow to the head took care of him." She grinned and gave me the rifle she was holding.

All at once I was starting to like Beth more and more. This side of her spoke my language. I was even tempted to kiss her, but I didn't think she was ready for this type of relationship yet. Better to stay as friends and wait for Hershel's blessing, if he would ever give it to me.

"Well, good for you. Now, would you be so kind to go and get a roll of duct tape? This guy's a medic, and he might just talk and tell us more about this whole shitfest."

She did, and this guy was wrapped up even tighter than Randall had been ten months beforehand. Beth took the wheel, and as we headed back to the prison, I prayed the Governor hadn't touched it while we were gone. However, that was mistaken.

**AN: Please review, reviews are the main way of me knowing I'm doing well on this story and I type faster knowing I've got a wider audience eager for more. Unless I say otherwise, I plan to do a chapter a day. Now that we've got the Daryl/Beth thing established to some degree, shift is going to focus on the Governor and Fort Benning threat for the next few chapters. As always, review/Favorite/follow!**

**-Jokerang**


	5. Love and Waterboards

"What the hell were you thinking?! Huh?!"

Just two hours ago James Wright had had some eighteen year old blond chick within his grasp. Now, he was under interrogation from his boss, the oh so mighty Major Jeremy Hanson.

After waking up from that girl's whack on the head, James had found himself just a foot away from a zombie trying to get a bite of his leg. While he had got out his sidearm, a Desert Eagle, and dispatched of the creature quickly enough, the gunshot only attracted more of those things. Without looking around for his other companions, James set off without either of them. However, that had only made both Hanson and this Governor man suspicious of him, and he was taken the 'Aquarium', the nickname for the torture and execution room in Fort Benning.

"I swear, I was out cold! That bitch got a hold of me-" His protests were cut short as that one-eyed man called the Governor entered.

"You mind if I take over this, Hanson?"

"By all means."

As Hanson left, the Governor took a seat and looked James directly in the eyes. Technically one eye.

"You know, kid, I don't blame you for what happened out there. We all chicken out every once in a while. I remember this one time, before the biters, when my boss - who, by the way, happened to be about your age - telling me shit about one thing after the other. I hated it, and I wanted him to know how much crap was coming out of his mouth day after day after day. But I didn't. I feared that it would cost me my job and good fortune, and I had a daughter to care for. A month later, out come the biters and I got to start from scratch. An extra month of being yelled at. Now that I look back at it all, I'd have voiced my opinions and taken the month of a dull live without pay. But I didn't, cause I was scared. Just like you were."

"No I wasn't-" James was getting anxious and nervous, fearing the worst.

"Yes, you were. And in the new world order, you either kill and then die..."

The Governor pulled out his handgun.

"...Or you die then kill." He fired two shots at James's chest. The former Army Ranger fell to the cold, dark floor, life slipping away from him by the second.

"Maybe you failed in life, but you can certainly serve me in death." Leaving the kid to die and turn, the Governor left and closed the door.

* * *

**Daryl POV**

Chaos. That was the only way to describe the situation from a distance at the prison. From the looks of it, one of the fences on the north side had been broken in some fashion. Walkers were pouring in. I wasn't sure of this lot was a herd passing by or if the Governor had dropped a group while passing by, but one thing was certain: the fence needed to be rebuilt and the walkers handled.

I got out of the car, taking his crossbow with him. I shot the first walker withing his line of sight, a former police officer by the looks if it, clean in the head. Moving to retrieve the arrow, a second walker blocked my path. Kicking it to the ground, I took out the hunting knife I always had sheathed away and stabbed the walker straight in the eye, killing it instantly. Unknown to me, two more walkers had spotted me and were on the path of heading to my arms and taking a bite or two. I turned around to catch one of their growling faces with spittle leaving it's mouth almost by the pint, it seemed. But before I could react in anyway possible - after all, I still had a perfectly good knife in my hand - gunshots rang out, catching both the walker in my face and the one behind it in their heads, and both walkers fell down dead.

A quick glance around me confirmed my suspicions on who the shooter could be: Beth. The M4 from the supermarket incident was in her hands, shaking a little, if more sturdy than in the past.

'Well," she asked. "How was that?"

"Lovely," I said in usual tone, not sure if I was describing the clean headshots Beth had just done or Beth herself. "Look," I said to her, "We've got friends on the way."

I wasn't lying to her. Michonne and Tyresse had spotted us and were rushing to help; him with his hammer, she with her ever so trusty katana. Michonne moved in for the kill, slicing off the heads of two walkers with one slash of the sword. Tyresse joined in, bashing in the head of another of those things that was two inches from her. Between them and us, we could take care of this small herd. And we did. One less worry for me. Rick was now on scene, accompanied by Carl and one of those hitchhikers Rick had taken in. His name was Austin or something but everyone called him the Whiz, because he was proving to be a jack of all trades. He could shoot, he could pull bullets out of you if you were shot at (if painful at times) and he even took care of Judith from time to time. No wonder Rick let him stay.

Looking around, Rick took notice of the destroyed fence. "No way walkers could have taken it down," he commented as he inspected the damage.

"No shit, Sherlock," I said as Tyresse spotted something on the ground. It was a pair of bolt cutters. He picked them up, looked at me, and we both nodded our heads. These had been used very recently.

"Someone must have used these while we were changing guard," said Tyresse. "Must have been watching us for a while, marked the spot and change of guard for future reference. Where they got the walkers from is another question."

"Oh really?" I asked him as I pointed to an empty van maybe ten meters from where we were standing. An inspection of the vehicle revealed blood and several severed limbs. Walker limbs.

"This has to be the Governor. He's using an old trick," said Rick. 'You and Beth don't look like everything's alright. Did anything happen?"

As best I could, I told Rick about the whole affair. About how the soldiers entered looking for Prison occupants on a run, how I had taken one of them out, how one of them (the one Beth must have told me about) escaped, and how one of them was tied up securely and gagged and blindfolded.

"Okay, You've just given us another Randall. You know we almost tore the group apart when we were deciding what to do with that kid. Now you expect us to-"

"This one's a medic, alright?!" I had my reasons for everything. "At least this one could be put to use, unlike that other sonofabitch."

I saw Rick think it over. His new policy was to only allow new people into the prison group if they could provide some kind of service. Take Gid, AKA Trapdoor for example. Back in the day, he was a Blackwater merc who saw action in Iraq and Palestine. He had been on his own for months till Rick found him and brought him back to E Block. That was where all newcomers stayed. The Wiz was kept because of his numerous abilities. But an actual medic was hard to come by these days. They could really need one, even if it was a man who just hours ago tried to end their lives.

"Keep him in isolation. Daryl, you question him about everything. Fort Benning, the Governor, what the officers at the Fort think of the Governor, everything." Rick looked worried. "If the Governor gets himself on an actual, trained fighting force..."

The way Rick left the sentence unfinished said everything.

As we all left the area and prepared to put up our weapons, someone poked me lightly on the back. I turned around. It was Beth.

"Hey," she said. I just wanted... to say thank you."

My heart raced again. Her eyes. Her face. Her figure. "Not at all. I did promise yer dad, after all. In fact, I should be thanking _you_. You saved my ass from those walkers."

To that, she took her hand and lightly patted it. My ass, that was. "Well, nice to know it's still in one piece. I've gotta check on Judith. Take care, okay?" She left, but not before kissing my cheek. I could've sworn I heard Carl giggling but maybe that was just me. As I made my way back to my own cell I encountered Carol. She smiled and said, "Well, I can see that you're falling for her all right."

"Well, maybe I am, but no one would approve of it. First thing Maggie and Hershel would do is come up to me with a pair of knifes and ask for a little chat."

Carol looked around. "I'm sure she likes you too. I can tell, cause she flirts with you all the time but she just doesn't realize it either. Tell her how you feel, when the get the chance."

"Are you telling me..." I was confused. Carol, on the other hand, was clearly not.

"Yes, I'm telling you it's possible. You just have to go one little step at a time."

* * *

I took the medic's head - his name was Jay, according to this piece of paper I found in his pocket - and lowered it to about forty-five degrees We were in one of the isolation block cells, and he was strapped to an inclined board. I wrapped a spare piece of cellophane on his head, with just a small gap around his moth for him to breath.

"Still just want to be a silent little prick and say nothin'?" I asked him aggressively. Jay was scared, that was a fact, but so far he'd taken all the punishment Rick and I had tried on him. We took turns punching him, shaking him up, even using a knife to pick at a wound that was on his arm. None of it had gotten to him yet. He shook around, said some "Please dont's" and "nos" but he still wasn't talking. Rick then had this idea, that he was in two minds about using, but I decided to take over and put this method to work. It was called waterboarding or some shit name that Rick said, though I could care less about the name and more about the effects.

With one go at it, I took a pail of water and poured the entire thing on Jay's head. As Rick had said to me, the gag reflex would take effect on the kid and he would squirm even more desperately that before, for now he was feeling like he was drowning.

When he finally came to his senses, he seemed to be broken in five different ways. "Alright, I'll talk, I'll take!" he shouted, his breaths coming in short, frequent pants.

"Good," I told him. "Tell me first about how the Governor came to your fort in the first place."

Jay took a deep breath, and began. "Well, one of his friends, name's Martinez or something, came to our place asking a whole bunch of things and stuff. Only reason he was even let in is because my boss - name's Hanson - knew him from high school or something. Ever since, the Governor and Martinez have been visiting for about an hour every other day. What they talk about is unknown. Only the higher ups got to tune in to their conversations."

"And what do the folks at Fort Benning think of him, huh?"

"We're divided. Half of us like him and the way he thinks, the other half just don't give a fuck. Those guys are the ones that don't really care."

I asked him more, including the population of Benning, the number of soldiers there, and such. He'd given reasonable trustworthy answers, considering he was scared to death. Afterwards, I went to tell Rick all of this. He closed his eyes, thinking hard about it. Then he must have came to a decision.

"Load him back in one of the vehicles," he said, referring to the scared medic/informant. "Go and gather your weapons, and tell Glen, Maggie, Trapdoor, and Whiz to do the same." He paced for a few seconds. "We're going to take ourselves a little trip to Fort Benning, to see how it's done and see of we can convince them that allying with the Governor is a bad mistake."


	6. On to Fort Benning

**Daryl POV**

"So why are we bringing Karen again?" I asked Rick as the group that was loading for Fort Benning finished the last of their weapons and supplies. I had the feeling she was going to be eye candy for Rick during what just might be our longest run to a specific location.

"She witnessed firsthand one of the Governor's crimes against humanity,' responded Rick. The term was an old one, but it sure fitted what the Governor had done to his own people. "That's going to be a major factor in convincing this Major Hanson to not side with the Governor. Same reason I'm bringing Glenn and Maggie along. I need every little thing that could tip the scales to tip in our favor. And besides, Karen can her keep cool in battle. She'll be fine."

I didn't think so, but went along with it anyways.

We were prepped and ready to start this little road trip. Glenn, Maggie and Karen took the van with Jay tied up nice and secure inside. Rick took those hitchhikers, Trapdoor and Whiz, in a police cruiser we'd found last week and got to start running again. I went before any of them, using Merle's old bike, the one I'd used for a year now. It was one of the few things I had left of my brother to remember him by.

It was a far longer drive than I'd expected. May of these parts of Georgia we'd never gone to, ever, not even during the winter months. During that ordeal, we usually ran in circles, trying to clear out the same five or six towns. We never got to that, though, cause walkers always came and fucked up all our progress before we even made a dent in clearing out anyplace. But these backroads and trails... some of them were so deserted that it looked like the walker apocalypse had never reached them.

Eventually the convoy reached a town halfway in between the prison and Fort Benning and pulled over at a gas station. Glenn and Maggie took it to themselves to clear the area of walkers, the Whiz found the gas needed to complete the journey to our destination, and Karen raided the Shell station for any necessities we could get our hands on.

Which left me, Trapdoor, and Rick going over our plans a second time. I was starting to like the Blackwater guy; his military training and outdoors experience were badly needed by our group, and the two of us had gone on several hunting trips together. Hershel had commented that the man was like Merle, only without the racism and aggression that had alienated Merle from the group the short time he was at the prison.

"First things first," said Rick, "this is a sort of diplomatic initiative. We've going over there to make peace, not war."

"And when it all goes to shit..." commented Trapdoor.

"Come on, man," I said to him. "Try and show some optimism. Always helps, doesn't it?"

"It didn't help when I was in Baghdad, a couple years back, when a bunch of the fundie-jundies captured me and my buddies protecting an oil field, and then proceeded to chop all their heads off. I was the last for whatever reason, and the Brits arrived in time - but only to save me, and none others."

"Sorry to hear it," said Rick.

"Not at all. They were the lucky ones, considering all of this we gotta face nowadays. Now, back to Fort Benning. We should bring our guns, just in case. We've got no idea if the Governor and his henchmen could be there. We just gotta be ready and prepared for anything."

"True," I chipped in. 'I'll trust you with everything, Claptrap."

Trapdoor's face turned red. He had told us once that Claptrap was an embarrising name for him, and it never failed to get a rise out of him. "For God's sake, why do you keep saying that to me?! I told you it was from a bad oral experience, now would you just stop?"

"Bad oral experience," said Rick. "You know, I've known a couple of ladies back in my day who could teach you all about that."

All three of us laughed. We needed something to keep our minds off the troubles that lay in our lives, even if it was a bunch of crude sexual humor.

Trapdoor pointed at me. "What about you? You look like the kind of guy that could make panties drop. Got your sights on anyone? Karen's not bad by the looks of it."

Rick nodded at him while Karen loaded the last of the things from the Shell station into the vehicles. I could see what Rick and Trapdoor saw in her. She couldn't have been younger than forty but she looked good for her age and she moved with a grace and agility I'd only seen a couple of times before. The first had been when Merle had brought one of his 'girlfriends' from a local harem and the other was a second grade teacher who flirted way too much and was dubbed a quirky sex addict, although at the time Daryl had no idea what half of those words meant.

However, my gut feeling was still pointing towards Beth. And although I wanted to take Carol's advice to express my true feelings, I had next to me the group leader and the only rival for his sidekick. Not to mention Beth's older protective sister and her fiancee were coming up. Now was not the time for anything. Better to wait and find a more convenient time for all this. Not gonna puke out a big secret to them right now.

"Yeah," I said. "Karen's not bad at all."

Having gotten all the supplies and gas we needed, the seven of us got in our respective vehicles and began the journey to Fort Benning part two. As I looked at the abandoned suburbs and empty farmlands, I thought about why Carol was even trying to play matchmaker with me and Beth. During the winter months, she'd gotten very close to me. And, to tell the truth, I considered her my best friend during that time. However, it was obvious to me that she saw me as more than just a friend. She saw me as a replacement to Ed. I still wasn't sure why I didn't feel the same way as her, but I just didn't. She'd seemed to handle it pretty well, though. I was certain Ed had done far worse to her.

Whatever. It was all in the past. Time to move forward.

* * *

Approaching Fort Benning, it wasn't hard to determine where the entrance was. It was the one place where a black, blood-stained twenty foot wall didn't stand. Two small guardtowers, each with an armed soldier with a machine gun, were positioned at each side. In addition, a checkpoint with a small posse of HAZMAT-clad soldiers - about ten or so - stood smack-dab in the middle of the road leading to the rest of the Fort.

One of the soldiers was not wearing a gasmask and biohazard suit, but rather a plain uniform with several stripes on his sleeve. I guessed that he was some sort of officer, a lieutenant or something. As we approached the checkpoint, he came up at us with his hand signaling to stop. "Halt!" he barked. "This is Fort Benning Army base. We are not taking in any travelers or hitchhikers. Take another step and my men will open fire."

"Now hold up just one minute there sunshine," I told him. "We're not your average survivors. We're here on a... Rick, what did you call it?"

"A diplomatic initiative," said Rick. "My name is Rick Grimes. I'm the leader of a group of survivors at the West Georgia Correctional Facility. I'm certain you've heard of us and our standings."

"Yes, I have." answered the officer, whose name read Vatz on his uniform. "Another man named the Governor has put a price on your head."

"Trust me, you don't want to do that. At least hear us out. We've come to Fort Benning to ask for a parley with Major Hanson. Some of his men attacked one of us and I want to ensure that neither side loses anyone else. We have a true threat out there, one that needs attention more than this."

"Whatever. I'm sure Major Hanson doesn't want you as an audience anyways."

Rick was about to say something, but i cut him off and tried a different card. "How about one of you go and tell this Hanson fella that his medic Jay pissed his pants and confessed that he secretly wished he could make gay love to all of y'all?"

Rick, Maggie, and the Whiz all gave me a _What the hell are you doing? _kind of look, like I was going to get us all killed then and there. But Vatz, all he did was break the cold stare he was giving me and laughed.

"You know, I like you. You have a sense of humor. Not many others around here have that. That's the only reason I'm going to give you your group a chance to talk to Hanson." With that, Vatz sent one of the guards to go and send a message.

A couple of minutes passed, and then Vatz had the seven of us escorted through Fort Benning. The guards formed a tight circle around us, and every once in a while one of the guards would 'accidentally' jab one of us with an elbow or trip us with a 'misplaced' rifle or such. I hated taking it, and I'm sure the others did as well, but none of us took the bait. We were here to make peace, not war, as Rick had said.

Fort Benning truly was a marvel in the world of today. I didn't want to be impressed with the place but I ended up being so anyways. It almost looked like if the government had not fallen and instead chose this particular fort to make themselves at home. I saw plenty of kids running around with toy guns and plastic dolls. A Starbucks was operational, and by the looks of it one soldier even had a laptop. I was shocked: did the Internet survive the apocalypse? Electricity certainty did, as every building had outdoor lights and air conditioning units. Even Woodbury paled in comparison to this place. The whole place seemed like a medium sized metropolis, before or after the apocalypse. I now wanted all the others at the prison to be here, just so that they could take a look and see that there was indeed hope in the world. Another half of me reminded myself that this place could be hostile for all we knew, and that the Governor could be lurking somewhere nearby.

Our little troupe finally reached a marked door. Vatz whispered something to the man watching the door, and he proceeded to unlock the door and let us in. We went down several flights of stairs and there we were.

We were now inside some kind of Pentagon-style command room. Table, desks, and even a couple of screens that operators were working on. Everywhere, everyone worked in a brisk, office like fashion. I caught a glimpse of what some of the tables had on them: maps. I saw the names of Forts Hood, Lewis, and Bragg. _Did a good portion of the US Army survive through all this?_ I wondered as we were brought to some kind of audience reception area.

The man facing us was a unique specimen. He was clean shaven, but there was not a bit of stubble to be found, like on many others I'd seen throughout all this. His brown hair was cut short and well kept. He wore a cameo uniform that that sported several shades of grey and black. A black bulletproof vest covered his chest. For his posture, he'd chosen to stand tall and cross his arms.

I was looking at the dead eyes of Major Jeremy Hanson.


	7. The Deal

**Rick POV**

"Ah, yes, you," said Major Hanson. "You must be those folks that the Governor must have been telling me about. I'm going to give you a chance to talk me out of having all of you turned over to him. Starting now."

I hesitated. "I'm Rick Grimes. Me and the others here are survivors from the West Georgia Correctional Facility. I;m here to tell _you_ that you really don't want to ally with the Governor. He's a very dangerous man and a casual backstabber." I had to make the intro to all this short and sweet. Hanson was already showing signs of hostility and needed to be put facing another direction.

"Oh really? I've seen nothing that indicates that the Governor is a serious threat. For starters, he didn't have his weapons in his hands like you are right now. He kept them in a holster."

"I understand that suspicion, but trust me, the guns are just a precaution. Face it you wouldn't show up at our front door unarmed, either? But seriously, take a look around. There's seven of us and dozens of you guys. We would we be so stupid to try anything stupid. That's not what I came here to talk with you about, though. What I came here to talk with you about is why you shouldn't trust the Governor and why you're better off without his and his so-called help he may be offering."

Hanson looked at me, then at each of the others, all with the same deadliness in his eyes.

"The matter is, while I respect your courageous decision to come here out manned and outgunned, I really can't just let you insult the friend of a friend that quickly in my presence. The only thing you'll need to worry about the manner of your deaths, which will be of my choosing." He made a hand signal. "Put them in your lines of sight."

And before any of us could react the slightest bit, we saw a dozen rifles and submachine guns aimed at us, head level, Hanson had pulled out his own Desert Eagle, and suddenly the situation was wasn't looking too clever anymore. A casual observer might be right in saying we were well and truly fucked.

But we weren't and I knew it, even as Hanson put the gun to my forehead. _Eyes on the prize Rick, _I thought to myself, _not the penalty. _There were six other lives at stake here, not just mine. Daryl, Karen, Trapdoor, Whiz, Glenn and Maggie had all place their complete faith in me, and I couldn't let them down now.

"Do you even know who this Governor is and what he did?" I asked Hanson.

"He used to run some town called Woodbury or something."

"And do you know what kind of rule he enacted during his time there?"

"Oh great, a bunch of sob stories," Major Hanson smirked. Either he hadn't heard of the Governor's atrocities to other human beings, or worse, he had and he just didn't care. I hoped it was the latter.

"He ruled a town based on lies and terror. He took his troops on what he called 'supply runs' which were really just massacring other groups of survivors and taking all they had. Like this group of soldiers. Are you friends with a man who killed a group of stranded soldiers, took their weapons, and told his home that they had been killed by walkers?"

"What are you talking about?" asked Hanson. He hadn't been fed the truth about this little incident. _Score one for me, _thought Rick as he smiled. Now he could make some progress with the man.

"It's true. He killed a military group and took their weapons and supplies." I went on to provide details that Merle had given me about the incident, including giving the dog tags that Merle had collected and stashed in his pocket when he went off on his own assassination attempt against the Governor. Daryl had found them and gave them to Rick soon afterwards. Hanson lowered his weapon, to the protests of his officers, and examined the dog tags.

"These guys came from Maxwell," said Hanson.

"And they were killed. From what you can see, the Governor has a very low opinion of anyone he encounters on the road. Even though you've got a nice operation set up here and you've got more troops than anyone in the region, he won't care. He's got such a low opinion of all of y'all, what's a good way of showing you guys that? By launching a coup against you and taking over, I suppose."

"I seriously doubt such a thing will come to pass."

"But it isn't a remote possibility. Did you know that the son of a bitch killed twenty-two of his own followers? In cold blood?"

Hanson frowned. "Yes, the man did mention that. Although I'm sure it was justified. They did try to get him killed."

My stomach turned. "Do you have any idea what a crock of bullshit that is?! We have one of the few survivors right her to tell her story. Karen, would you please tell this man the truth?"

Fighting back tears, Karen told the horrific story. She told of how the Governor had started out rallying the people he had with him to attack the prison and take revenge for the guards Merle had killed earlier. As they examined the seemingly abandoned building, they were suddenly opened fire upon and forced to flee. On one of the roads leading back to Woodbury, the Governor pulled the convoy over and ordered his men to go back. Scared and tired of fighting, most of the Governor's troops refused, with the notable exceptions of Martinez and Allen. Then the Governor opened fire.

"Are you sure of all this?" Hanson seemed still skeptical.

"Of course I am!" Karen was visibly very upset. "Men and women we'd known for months, good friends and neighbors, taken away for one reason: they disobeyed that inbred bastard who think's he's some kind of enlightened governor. He shot our limbs and abdomens first, to ensure we felt pain, then proceeded to execute us with headshots one by one. I only survived because I had the corpse of another man to hide the fact I was still alive. Even the three that he left alive were shaken. I know it."

Hanson, for a man that had been looking cold-hearted from the start, finally dropped his head. But only for a second. "What do you propose?" he asked me, the leader.

"No, boss, what are you doing?" asked one of his subordinates in a very concerned matter.

"Can it, Clancy!" snapped back Hanson.

"But they lie. They will lie and say anything they can to save their own necks. I just know it. I'm-"

"I will be the judge of that, thank you very much," said Hanson. I couldn't help but hold back a small smile. Rejecting one of his own officer's advice was a surefire sign i was starting to make sense to him.

"I'm proposing," I said, "a pact of some kind. If we work together and have our forces allied with each other, I think we could give the Governor and any other sick freaks out there a run for their money."

Hanson stepped back, made a thoughtful sound, and put away his Desert Eagle. I wasn't in danger of a headshot anymore. Hooray.

"I'm still not convinced that the Governor means ill towards me or anyone here at Fort Benning," said Hanson. "However..."

It was a substantial_ however, _ and it made half the officers in the room, including Vatz, to go "Hmph!" while the men with their guns aimed at us looked at Hanson, for their boss was going to tell them something of much importance soon.

"In light of the this new evidence," spoke Hanson, "it would be foolish of me not to give this matter some degree of consideration. Fort Benning and it's security will always come first over any outsiders. Rick, if you and I do indeed share a common threat, then it would not be inconceivable that some sort of combined effort to repel such foes could be made. I am NOT promising anything. Do not go back and tell the others at your prison that Fort Benning is going to take them in or that we are now friends forever. That is not such."

"What can I tell my people, then?" I asked the Major. Slowly he was becoming more friendly, if that.

"Tell them that my top advisers and I will discuss and debate the issues, and that, in our own time, will will come up with an answer to your proposal. We will send our own delegation - armed as heavily as your's - and give you our answer at some time."

"When?"

"Don't push me, Rick Grimes. Don't make my patience go away when it just came back for you."

"Well then," I said, concluding that this was all I was going to get out of him. "It's been a pleasure doing business with you," I said as I gave him a had to shake on it. Hanson looked at it for a couple of seconds, then completed the handshake.

Hanson proceeded to snap his fingers. "Let them go," he commanded. "Let them keep their weapons, and escort all of them out of Fort Benning. No one is to harm them. If anyone does, they will answer to me." The look on his face signified that he wasn't kidding.

I gave off a long and relieved sigh. It had worked. For now.

* * *

**Daryl POV**

Taking the lead as the group exited the underground complex and was escorted back to the top, I gave myself and Rick a pat on the back. I looked back at the others, and we were all feeling double-dicked-dog pleased with ourselves and Rick. I had to give the man some credit: he'd held his nerves and it had payed off. One careless word by him and we would have all been slaughtered. And now we were hoping that Hanson and his officers would come on board and help us. There were folks at the prison who wouldn't be happy with the whole thing, but ho hum. They were just going to have to live with it. This whole idea made much strategic sense: we needed the numbers and strength that Fort Benning could provide if we were going to both survive and flourish in this world. It was a good day's work, and we'd be sipping beer and munching on a feast when we got back.

Little did I know, while thinking all these happy, cozy thoughts, that a huge consignment of shit was on its way to hitting a large and rapidly spinning fan.

**AN:**

**There you go. I've left a little cliffhanger to keep you guys eager for more.**

**I don't usually do this, bu I'm going to. Someone is going to die in the next chapter. Who is a mystery.**

**As always, review and follow/favorite. They keep me moving and writing new chapters fast!**

**-Jokerang**


	8. Shit Hits the Fan

**Daryl POV**

The seven of us were in a single file line, with me and Rick at the head and turning a sharp corner, so there was no way I could have seen what exactly started the whole clusterfuck. All I knew was that, suddenly someone was firing shots, one of our escorts was lurching in pain, and other guards were firing back, and the two guards closest to me and Rick were suddenly onto us, dropping their guns for knifes to preform what they thought were going to be easy kills.

It didn't turn out so well for those two guards. After Rick and I dropped their bodies, I spun around to find all kinds of chaos erupting. Guns fired on all sides. Vatz was ordering his men to stand firm and strike back. They weren't too keen on obeying orders, probably because about three or so of them were dead on the ground, blood pumping through bullet holes their HAZMAT suits. I first saw Glenn and Maggie taking cover behind some oil barrels, laying down covering fire. Trapdoor and the Whiz were backing off towards the nearest corner, both of them blasting away as they moved. Karen wasn't immediately in view.

We were in some kind of alley tunnel, with only two entrances in or out of the place. Some stores were there, but every civilian had either fled the area or hid in one of the stores. Vatz was getting forces marshaled, and they began moving in an arrowhead formation down the alley. Our lot, now with Rick on scene, continued to build up the defensive measures. I, for the most part, was shocked at how things went south so quickly, but knew that we couldn't just give up and die right now, so I joined the fray.

Finally I spotted Karen. She was crouching over, clutching a wound in her belly. She was using what strength she had to make her way to one of the store entrances. I ran towards her, but one of the soldiers blocked my path, slowly raising his rifle towards me. Acting fast, I took out the Glock that was my sidearm and shot away at his left shoulder. As he dropped his weapon to hold the wound, I finished him off and continued to run towards Karen.

Someone else was also making his way to Karen, and he happened to be much closer. It was Vatz, and he was slowly pulling out his Desert Eagle along the way. I tried firing off a few rounds at him, but my aim was off and they missed. I don't think that Karen was even aware that the bastard was on a beeline for her. She was just moving along towards the store entrance, perhaps in the hope that the inside would offer some kind of sanctity...

And then Vatz lowered his handgun and fired off a single shot, shooting Karen's head clean and military style.

"NO!" I roared as I hit Vatz with all my might with the handle of the Glock. As he reeled back from the blow, I quickly double-tapped him at almost point blank range. His brains hit the floor before anything else. While he died, I turned to Karen's side, but there was nothing that could be done for here anymore. The bullet Vatz had fired had left her dead. Permanently. I felt myself growing sad. This woman had already escaped death at the hands of the Governor, only to be struck down here. Noah was going to be devastated.

I rose shakily. Took stock.

The rest of Vatz's squad was closing in on the others, who were still in their positions. Bullets were picking the enemies off one by one, but others came to fill in the gaps. And that brought into play another problem: we hadn't brought heaps of ammo, like someone back at the prison suggested. The guns had been meant for show and security. None of us had anticipated on using them on a full scale ding-dong. I saw Glenn lunge at one of the soldiers with his Mossberg 590 as a club, having used up all the shells he had brought. After that, he pulled out his sidearm, a Browning BDA. After the one clip in it, Glenn would be out of ammo for good. From the way Trapdoor was using his M4 on single-shot, I guessed he was also running low as well. There was only one thing we could do now.

"Let's get out of here!" I yelled. As they slowly came out of the alleyway, Rick provided enough covering fire for first Whiz and Trapdoor, then me, and finally Glenn and Maggie to make their way out. I did my best to lay down my own covering fire with the Ak47 I'd brought; the crossbow was going to be insufficient in this mess.

"Anyone know what the fuck happened back there?" Glenn yelled as I tried to navigate a way back to the entrance we came from. It was our one and only way out of here. "Who started firing and why?"

"Save it, Short Round," I told him. "We can go over that later. First let's try to escape without dying."

I headed around another corner, and who would've guessed, another patrol of soldiers. This lot had been obviously alerted by the fight in the alley and were dead set on killing us. We dispatched of them pretty fast, but if cost us precious bullets, and the men trailing us would be getting a bonus in time it took to reach us. Then a whirling object spun past my ear. It appeared to be some kind of knife. If it had been an inch more to the right I would be deaf in my left ear. Two more inches and not being able to hear would have been the least of my worries.

"Move!" Rick bellowed, and we all began running as fast as we could, laying down suppressing fire behind our backs whenever we could. We were in athlete mode, getting in enough air to meet the muscular system's demands for oxygen and nothing else. Maggie, the youngest of us and also the fastest, was making good progress, but she would burn out eventually. We all would, and we knew it. While we were faster than the soldiers as they were burdened down with all that equipment, they were no doubt in better shape than us, having been doing whatever army people did to keep in shape. We ahead of them but just barely. The moment we slowed down they would be on us in no time, and once our remaining bullets were spent and our guns were out of the equation, we had as much chance of surviving as I did of sleeping with Beth Greene.

Which might happen, but only if Hershel's moral code was lowered to Merle's level or I was the last non-impotent man on the planet.

Then we reached some kind of pit, with a muddy and crudely built stairway leading out of it. The area seemed clear of soldiers, and I gave the word for the Whiz to start up the steps, followed by Rick, and then the rest of us. Then I realized why there were no humans here: several doors opened and dozens of walkers dressed in military attire came out. This place was a walker pen. It looked like the Governor had taught Hanson a few tricks during his time here.

The steps didn't help. Each of us got our shoes caught in the mud several times, not helped by the mob of walkers, which also got caught in the mud as well but they were more numerous as us and not so afraid of death. In fact, one of them got close enough to reach for my ankle to try and scratch it. It didn't, but it did get a grip on my AK47 and drag it down to where it was unsafe to reach for it. I had to stop, turn around, and expend bullets on him and several other dangerously close walkers. This helped us by sending down the dead bodies on the other walkers to pull out of their way, although the Glock's slide had locked back, indicating that it was useless to me.

Whiz reached the top first, gunning down a couple of guards who had been watching our struggles to get out with amusement. Then Maggie took it to herself to defend the stairway. With her M4 on single shot she began planting rounds in the walker heads as the rest of us got out on the road. She did a pretty good job of it, provided that she got the parts of the head not covered with a helmet or gas mask. She didn't have the luxury of missing, and she didn't have an infinite supply of ammo as well. But she stayed there, steadying her breath and making as many clean kills as possible.

Talk about nerves of steel.

She was only postponing the inevitable, though. Some of those walkers would be coming out, not to mention more men with guns after us. I'd imagined by now that Major Hanson had been informed that, for reasons unknown, the prison people had betrayed his trust and had gone rogue. He would be extremely mad, sending every soldier he had in the place with orders to bring back our cocks on skewers and our heads on pikes.

We had minutes left, if that.

Then: a miracle. The original checkpoint we'd entered in was in our sights. Everyone sprinted towards it. While we headed for cover, two of the soldiers that had been guarding the place the first time around spotted us and began heading for our group, FAL rifles in hand and ready to be set off in a minute's notice. Glenn's Browning sidearm fired it's last, killing one of them. I took out the hunting knife I always had on me and lunged for the other's neck, catching him just behind the earlobe. Pulling out the knife, a good amount of blood came out, staining both me and him as he went down with a heavy slump.

"I'm out!" cried Maggie, expending the last of her bullets on a slowly but surely approaching walker herd. "What do we do?"

"Keep pushing towards the entrance!" said Rick. "It's our best shot out of here!"

Then another trio of guards, these wielding melee weapons, approached us, and a quick check of the others confirmed the worst: every one of us was out of ammunition. Maggie's last shots on her M4 had been our collective last.

_No time to waste_, I thought to myself as I threw my knife at the first of the bastards straight in the eye. While he was going down, I went to him and fumbled for his pistol. The other two weren't so excited about this, and proceeded to wrestle with me. Finally, I got a grip on the revolver and shot the second man in the gun. He fell down in pain. He wasn't killed immediately, but the wound would immobilize him for the time being. This left the third man. He swung what appeared to be a fancy metal tomahawk at my head, and I only avoided needing serious plastic surgery by twisting my damn head like some circus acrobat. Then Glenn tried to help, but the only thing that resulted was that the kid got a forearm slashed almost clean to the bone. He fell back, gripping the wound, hissing words of pain.

That son of a bitch made a big mistake in hurting Glenn for two reasons. First, it pissed off Maggie and she came running at him with all her might, knocking him off of his feet. Secondly, it allowed me to cock the revolver that was currently in my hands and aim it at the man as he tried to get back up on his feet. The last thing he saw was my smirking face with a gun pressed against his jawbone.

But these little fights had allowed the walker horde to close in on us and had blocked off every avenue of escape but the one we wanted: out of Fort Benning.

And coming from there were three gas mask wearing soldier armed with M4s, slowly closing in on us. We were sandwiched between two formidable groups of enemies wit no way out.

"Dear God..." Maggie was now saying a prayer to herself. "If your plan involves bringing me to your presence today, right now, please make sure tha my sister, father, and everyone back home are kept safe under your care..."

I felt like joining. No atheists in foxholes and all that. Somehow, though, I just couldn't bring myself to join her. The trio of armed me were slow in their approach, knowing that we were screwed and we knew it. Their eyes from under those masks looked gleeful, and I couldn't blame them. They were the ones who would have the honor of gunning down the group of people that had killed so many of their comrades. They had fire in them.

"Sell yourselves dearly, I don't want them to think we're a bunch of pussies," I told the others. One last remark before our demises.

Trapdoor seemed on the point of speaking. There was something urgent on his mind.

Then, out of nowhere, salvation.

**AN: So Karen is dead. Hope that's doesn't upset too many of you.**

**So many questions now: what caused the whole fight? How will the group be saved? All will be revealed in good time.**

**Also, I just watched World War Z. I highly recommend that you go and see it.**

**-Jokerang**


	9. Here We Remain

**Daryl POV**

Salvation. No one anticipated it, and not exactly a direct response from the man upstairs to Maggie's prayer, but it happened.

While the trio of soldiers were approaching us, one of them was walking at a slower pace than the other two, for reasons unknown to us. Then, out of the blue, one of the other two soldiers fell to his knees, clutching what appeared to be a wound in his neck. As soon as his friend went to his side to investigate, he too was shot in the neck. Then the soldier that had shot both of them went to each of them and delivered a walker-preventing headshot.

Everyone was stunned, but not stunned enough to follow the soldier's orders to "Get on the ground now!" when he barked it to us.

We did, fearing the worse. We could be killed by this guy or those walkers, getting closer and closer, could eat us. But before they could, bullets began flying. Walker bits and heads went flying everywhere, torn to shreds by the man's machine gun. The walkers kept coming, but they just kept getting mowed down by the most impressive display of firepower I've ever seen in my life. After maybe two minutes of this, all the walkers were dead. No one else was around. The six of us looked at our unknown savior.

He looked at us for a second, and then, from a voice distorted by the gas mask: "What are y'all doing? More are bound to come. Follow me if you want to live."

With little choice on our parts, we ran to follow him out of here and towards our vehicles. As we went along, Rick asked the unknown man, "Who are you and why do you think we can trust you?"

From behind that mask, a familiar pair of eyes looked back at him, then at me. Then he casually removed the mask to reveal the face of a twenty-five year old maybe, but one that had been in our presence before. At the prison.

"Well, you kept me alive when others would've killed me," responded Jay the medic. "And besides, I never really liked those folks in Benning anyways. Now if y'all excuse me, I'm going to try and get a Humvee for myself. The rest of y'all better get your vehicles. I'll be following."

Rick and I were even more surprised. We didn't know whether he had somehow escaped from the vehicle himself or some soldiers had raided our vehicles and helped him out of here, but either way Jay was putting his balls and life on a very fine line to ally with us and help us escape. I had my doubts, and started to ask Rick if he could possibly be a spy of some sorts, by Rick dismissed it.

"The man went through our tortures, yet still decided to rescue us when the obvious option would to do the opposite: not save us. He's coming for now, and his medical skills will be badly needed. Maybe Hershel could us his help. Tell him to come last with his Humvee; we don't want to attract anymore attention than we just did for the last twenty minutes."

I did, and even though if took all of us five minutes to get our vehicles started and ready to leave together, no complications were encounter by either us or Jay. The kid had managed to let an officer let him borrow a Humvee, supposedly for the purpose of chasing us in the forests. As I started the engine on Merle's moterbike, a nagging thought came through my head. I didn't want to believe it, but it came again and again that I was convinced that it was true. Now was not the time to discuss with anyone, though. Our asses had just been save from a fire, and me, more than anyone in the group, had no intention of starting another one for a stupid, crazy proposition that would get me kicked out.

* * *

Eventually we reached the same Shell station that we had stopped by on the way there. Decided this was good place to restore ourselves and talk this shit over.

The other five were standing with me in sullen silence, no one really wanting to talk or really do anything. Jay was keeping watch, as part of Rick's deal with him: pull your weight around for a week, and we'll take you in as one of our own. Glenn's arm was now bandaged up, a nifty piece of field dressing Jay had managed to apply to him, and he'd also gotten a bunch of pain killers from our new friend. Whiz had suffered some kind of concussion from hitting his head too hard when we had to get down to allow Jay to gun down those walkers, but in every other aspect he seemed alright, and he even joked that it was only his brain that suffered and no major organs. I checked myself for scratches from that close encounter with those walkers in the pit but found none. We all just stood there and avoided each other's gazes. Each one of us had a face like a slapped cock.

Someone had to get this little discussion started. Guess I was to be that person. "Well", I said, "that went swimmingly, didn't it?" Which won a couple of weak smiles and nothing else.

Then Rick took charge. "Alright, let's get this over with. Who fired first? Why? Someone must have seen something." He got shrugs and silence.

"Come on, what happened?! Anyone, give me something!"

"It was Karen, I think," said Trapdoor. "Not 100% sure, of course, but she was behind me and that was where the shooting started."

"Weren't you taking the rear?" I asked the Whiz. It was notable how neither him or anyone else laughed or giggled at the phrase _taking the rear_. We all might have had a laugh if this had been four hours earlier, but not now. Nothing was very funny right now. He nodded solemnly.

"So you would've been following Karen. Was it her? Did she shoot for some reason?"

"I don't know, Rick, I honestly don't know. I wasn't looking her way when it all happened. First thing I saw about it was a couple of soldiers had fallen, and so had Karen. If I had to take a stab at it, one of the soldiers made a move on Karen and she struck back the only way she could: with a gun."

"Why the hell would they do that, bro?" I asked Whiz. "Major Hanson himself had given them orders not to hurt us in anyway or they would have to answer to him."

"Yeah, but you have to remember the way they were treating us as they brought us in," Trapdoor chipped in. "Maybe one of them had forgotten what Hanson had said about treating us, got a bit too far on the bullying, and like Whiz said, she had to strike back. I mean, seriously: Hanson had been talking about executing us not ten minutes earlier. Plus, I spotted guards sizing up both Karen and Maggie lie they hadn't seen a woman in years, so one of them making a move on Karen makes sense."

The others echoed this with another round of disgruntled grunts and "Yea, maybe." Only Rick seemed unsatisfied. The trip to Fort Benning had been his idea, and his smooth talking had not earned us any brownie points in the long run. We'd managed to get out alive, but no one was happy that our lives had been endangered in the first place.

"I'm taking responsibility for this mess," said Rick with a heavy heart. "My plan, my fuck-up. I need to know what went wrong so that we don't suffer from the same experience in the future. Karen was one our better fighters, and I feel responsible for her death-"

"It ain't yer fault, Rick," I told him. "It was mine. I tried to get to her side but that cocksucker Vatz was too close."

"No it's mine. I suggested that Karen come along, and the same with the rest of you. If any more of you had died, your blood would have been on my hands, and my hands alone-"

"Rick, don't talk like that." Maggie was clearly upset by Rick's negativity.

"I have to. Now, is there anything else that could have been seen that caused this disaster?"

A couple moments of silence.

"Maybe Karen got a little careless," said Glenn. It had been the first time he had spoken since his arm had gotten that nasty cut, and he looked distraught. "Maybe she had her finger in the trigger guard and she let it go by accident."

Trapdoor and I both shot him a look of _Are you fucking kidding me? _but Rick stepped in and took over, obviously to prevent any fights. We didn't need them now.

Rick shook his head. "I don't think that was the case. She had been a part of the Woodbury Army when it still existed, and was pretty good during her time at the prison, keeping watch duty. And she knew better than to do something as stupid as that."

"Still, accidents happen."

"And when those type of accidents happen, they happen to be tragic school shootings or bank shootouts," said Rick. "Somehow, I just can't wrap my head around your idea, Glenn. It just doesn't make sense to me."

"Maybe," said Maggie in a conciliatory tone, "maybe we should just chalk this up to experience and move on. Rehashing everything to us isn't going to change anything and it won't bring back Karen. I'll miss her because she and I were starting to get close, almost as close as some of the friends I had before the apocalypse, and she was helping me one day during my guard duties and she turned out to be an even better shot than I was. But she's gone. I don't like it any more than anyone else, but we're just going to have to come to terms with her death. Like daddy did at the farm."

Rick, on the other hand, did not seem ready to come to any terms.

"We lost someone _and _screwed up the mission," snapped Rick, clearly pissed off. "Our chances of bringing that Army base on our side have been utterly destroyed, so forgive me if I'm not going to put any of this behind me, Maggie."

"All I'm saying is, we're alive at least, even if it was a fight to stay alive for a while. Remember it wasn't a total disaster."

Rick looked like he wanted to kill something, and he go his wish when a lone walker showed up. Rick grabbed a fireaxe, stabbed the thing in the head, and then proceeded to utterly destroy the walker's head.

That was the last thing we did at the Shell station, and when we finally got back to the prison at around evening, our little convoy carried some very surly and irritable passengers.

Folks at the prison looked optimistic and cheerful, though. That changed when we had to the bearers of bad news.

* * *

The funeral for Karen, if you could call it that, took place first thing the next morning.

All of us, from the Atlanta survivors, to the Greene family, and the Woodbury people and hitchhikers, had gathered outside for a couple of speeches that were made by Hershel, Glenn, and Rick in that order.

Hershel, who in his time at the prison had taken the role of spiritual leader and the closest thing to a priest, began with words of comfort and support to Karen's son Noah. It broke my heart and it broke everyone else's to see him in such pain. As far as we knew Karen had been the last relative he had in the world, and her death came as a very heavy blow to him.

"Now son, I know you are in great pain, and i understand," said Hershel. "But look around you. There is not one of us who did not have a loved one lost, whether it be to the walkers or the intentions of evil men. We are here for you and can help."

Glenn's speech was more of a lookback on Karen's life and time at both Woodbury and the prison. Using information he had collected from both the Woodbury people and Maggie's talks with the late woman, he'd put together a brief description of her life and the amazing person she was, etc. And then Rick... Rick just stood there, at the wooden cross that had been placed in our little cemetery. in the time here we'd gone ahead and placed crosses for everyone we cared about that had died along the way. Everyone from Amy, Jim and even that Doctor named Jenner all the way to the massacred Woodbury army and Karen. He proceeded to talk about it was his fault that Karen had died, how he wasn't going to lose anyone else to the soldiers, and how everyone had to be on alert in case Hanson and his boys decided to launch a counterattack.

But none of this really was processed in my head. The only thing I could think of was that damned thought I had when riding the motorbike the way back to the prison. Like a moth, it kept fluttering, unable to get out of my head, and making me a lot unsure about a lot of people living under the same roof as I did.

_Sabotage._

**AN:**

**Chapter 9 is here and completed. Cookies to anyone who gets the comic book reference in regards to the chapter title. Next chapter we'll see Daryl battle his inner demons and some Daryl/Beth as well.**

**Please continue to review/favorite/follow. Don't be afraid to offer suggestions and criticism as well. I'm only an amateur author and could gladly use your advice.**

**-Jokerang **


	10. Virtues and Vices

I had to have been dreaming.

I was in that damned arena again, the one the Governor had set up, filled with walkers. Had my trusty crossbow and a gun. Everyone around me was screaming "Death! Death! Death!", their screams becoming chants as Martinez came in, blew a whistle, and yelled "Let the games begin!"

I had my crossbow ready, aiming at the opponent Martinez pointed at in the shadows. But the adversary was no ordinary person.

It was Merle. And it wasn't Merle at the same time.

This version of Merle was the walker version, the Merle he'd found at that barn storage place where the Governor had planned an ambush for Rick. But it had been Merle who was the one to take the initiative, but in the end he'd failed. The Governor had shot him and left him to turn. An enormous red stain covered most of his white muscle shirt, his mutilated hand was covered in guts from some victim, and his eyes had turned yellowish-grey, colors that reminded me of death.

I couldn't. I just couldn't.

But there really wasn't any other option.

As I pushed this thing, this monster that was not my brother in any way, I heard the people around us cheering for the Merle walker. They wanted to see me die and turn. But one voice stood out among all the others. One that I'd wished I'd never have to hear in my life after it's owner had gotten bitten and put down by my uncle.

"What a fucking failure you are, Daryl! Can't kill anything, you god for nothing piece of shit son!"

My father, the one that beat me and Merle senseless at least twice a week during my childhood, was among the bastards and bitches that had settled down and created a town they called Woodbury. He looked like he always did, drunk and most likely high off something, breath smelling of cigars and alcohol, stubble that turned into a beard, and a beer belly that never seemed to go away, even with all those hunting trips.

I wanted to punch that bastard and show him what I'd felt for all those years of abuse and torture, but a strong sturdy hand grabbed my shoulder and pushed me down to the ground.

"You know, I didn't expect you to be the type of person that just walks away from a good fight," said the voice of that person. "But I won't let you harm your dad. He's under my protection and such. By the way, how does it feel to screw up everything for Rick and the others? Youu're just like that stupid sheriff, you look around and see friends, but in the end you can never recognize the devil beside you."

I looked up. The Governor, his arm around my drunken dad's.

That fucker.

He pushed me back in the pit, and said "Now go fight your brother. I've got your dad, and everyone else in your family is dead, so I guess the brothers will kill each other."

As I looked at the Merle walker, it's eyes seeing another potential source of food, I wondered if the Governor was referring to Merle as the devil besides me. But then I froze. Merle wasn't the devil besides me, it was someone in the prison.

The devil beside me,

Devil beside me.

Devil...

And then I woke up, panting for air. It was nighttime, and the only sounds I could hear around me were the snores of some of the others and, if my ears didn't deceive me, the cries of Little Asskicker.

I got up out of my cell. I needed a walk outside to clear my head, and besides, the baby needed comfort that I could provide.

* * *

For about a week after the Fort Benning incident, life almost seemed to return to normal again. I guess you could use the word 'normal' because that was exactly what it was.

After Karen's funeral, Rick began to get more and more paranoid. He began putting more people on watch all day, stepped up the gun and knife training of the Woodbury citizens, drew new prison evacuation plans, and even banned Carl from going on a raid that day. His pretense for all of this was that now that we'd pissed off Fort Benning (even if it wasn't my fault), they were likely to come scout the area, then later storm with everything they had. Army people had a reputation for not letting their enemies go unpunished. Merle had told me enough stories to reinforce that in my mind.

But an attack never came. It seemed either Major Hanson had decided that revenge was not the thing this world needed, or, much more likely, he was planning something big. Very big. With no attack coming anytime soon, people started to voice their dissent against Rick's new style of ruling, calling it close to the Governor's. Eventually Rick brought his inner circle - nowadays consisting of me, Hershel, Glenn, Tyresse, Trapdoor, Maggie, and two of the Woodbury elders - and we talked out the whole thing. Rick relented, cutting down on the security measures, but he still wanted the watch to be at least three people at all times, and that when they could, some of the Woodbury people were to be taken on carefully safe runs, for practice and experience. Every person trained counted, he said, and we needed everyone trained.

Even more than Rick, I was still pretty pissed off about Fort Benning and losing Karen, and I might have betrayed these thoughts more than one time. For example, when one of the older men from Woodbury asked about how things could've been that bad during that day we went down to the fort, I suggested that he shove his stupid baseball cap up his ass and the novel he was reading as well. We had a bit of a heated argument, but fortunately Carol was there to defuse the situation and keep the two of us on somewhat good terms. Then there was another incident at lunch, when Rick and Carl were discussing why the boy couldn't have gone to Fort Benning with the rest of us.

"I mean, if I had just started shooting up the place, I couldn't have done a worse job that you and Daryl-"

That did it. I slammed my silverware down and walked up to that kid.

"Better watch your goddamn mouth boy. You wouldn't have lasted two seconds without me or-"

At that point Carl tried to deck me, but Rick was there to play United Nations and calm down Carl. "Look son," he said, "both me and Daryl are taking Karen's death personally. Just let him be."

"Whatever," said Carl. "At least my run with Beth that day actually got things and supplies of worth, instead of screwing up a pointless plan and leaving a dead body behind-"

At that point, I tried to deck _him, _and I got in one punch before a combined Herculean effort of Rick, Tyresse and the Whiz got me off of him.

* * *

Back to Lil' Asskicker. I went to her crib, wondering what she was wailing her eyes out in the middle of the night for. I was within three steps of the crib when I found that I wasn't alone in the nursery cell.

Beth was there, feeding the baby with a bottle.

I couldn't help but just stay there and absorb her features. Indeed, she was gorgeous, even if I couldn't bring himself to say myself. Her big, blue eyes looked down at the infant with love and support. The golden locks of her hair fell past her shoulders, and tank top she had on did nothing to hide her figure and did everything to empathize it. It was taking everything I had not to be caught staring at her, for fear she'd view me as a stalker. However, she was the one who broke the silence when she looked up and noticed my presence.

"Whoa! you almost scared me half to death just there!"

'Well, don't," I told her. "You up checking on the asskicker too?"

"Yep," she replied, with the soft voice she usually replied to me whenever we talked, and those times were growing more and more frequent. "Don't know what scared her. Would you mind holding her for a few second while I get her a change of diaper?"

"My pleasure," I said as she passed me the bundle of happiness into my arms. As I looked at the child I currently cradled, I could tell this was not Rick's child. There were too many facial features on this baby that couldn't be inherited from Rick. Instead, most of them were Shane's. But not like it made much of a difference now. Rick still cared for the girl like he cared for Carl, and my it was the cutest baby I'd seen in years. So sweet and adorable.

Also fitting under the category for cutest things I'd seen in years was Beth's ass. I could only watch as she reached under the bottom bunk for Judith's diapers. I certainty didn't mind the view from my eyes as she came up and pulled out the spare diapers. Giving her Judith, I took a moment to think about how the two of us had been for the past few weeks. Beth was always finding time to interact with me, flirting and teasing with me however girls did with boys they liked. It seemed that she was trying to get closer to me, but for reasons I didn't really know. I was guessing that she found me kind of attractive, but I didn't think that was the case. All throughout my life girls ran from me. Merle was always scoring with someone against all odds, but I usually ended up resorting to a hooker from time to time. Carol kept pushing at me to try her out but I felt she was doing that out of pure jealousy. She knew things between us had failed, and she probably just wanted to subtly punish me for doing so by making me creep out the barely legal virgin.

Then, as Beth finished changing Judith's diapers, I had an idea.

"Well, I think I'd best be leaving, " I told Beth. "I need to clear my head and take a voluntary guard duty/walk."

"Wait," she said as I headed out the cell door. "Can I ask a favor of you?"

She could have asked me for ten. "What is it, girlie?"

"Can... can I come with you outside?"

* * *

And s

And so the two of us walked our way towards one of the still intact guardtowers, making idle chitchat and learning more about each other under the bright moonlight.

We'd started out finding that each of us was having some serious nightmares for some time now. "It was about Merle," I told her, recalling what I remembered about the night's dream. 'He was... turned, and there stood my drunken father and that Governor bastard standing right next to him. Nothing I could do, just kill or die." Beth listened with sympathy as she usually did for me or her family.

"That..." she said, "that sounds so awful. Like this one time I dreamed about everything that happened at the farm." She began to recite what seemed like a horror story, but in reality was just another sad incident in what we called this sorrowful life.

"Sorry to hear it," I said to her. "Though it couldn't have been as bad when..." And I gave her my story of how I survived in the woods for those days, using poison oak as toilet paper and such. I even added enough humorous details to get a few giggles out of the girl. Eventually we reached the guardtower we were headed for, and stopped inside it to absorb the view. Not too many walkers, we were lucky this night.

I put down my crossbow to rest my hands on the rails. Just then, my shoulders began aching and hurting. Must have sprained it coming up the stairs. I gave off a little sound of pain and hoped that Beth wouldn't hear it. However, she did, and she came to my back and began to gently massage it with her soft little hands.

"You know, its so cute when you're in pain," said Beth. "You're so reserved and aloof, and I rarely see you show emotion like this."

I couldn't help but think that was true, to a degree. Even after nine months of living with these people, I'd still kept my distances from the others, because I'd learned from my childhood to avoid other people and just take everything with the flow, like my mama once said before she'd fallen to the alcohol and buzz. But Beth... Beth was the second person to accept his other side. Carol was the first, but she'd wanted much more, and he... e just couldn't accept that. And they'd agreed to let it go, even though their undying friendship remained strong as ever. Beth was different, though. Maybe it was she was half my age, and even young enough to be my daughter if he thought about it. Maybe it was the fact whenever I saw her she was always just so sweet and even appeared naïve sometimes, unlike Carol, who was more like the survivor type that I fitted under. My guesswork was that opposites tended to attract, especially when the options were so limited and a walker apocalypse could end your life at any second.

Then Beth said something that stunned both of us.

You know, it's just us here, alone. We could do whatever we wanted."

I was stunned. I had heard that attitude in voices before, along with that look of desperation and eagerness. Usually Merle's girlfriends put on that persona, and he and her would usually head off to a bedroom to do whatever. I could tell what she wanted by that look on her face , and I was thinking it wasn't such a bad idea.

And at the same time, it very much was.

"Oh no you don't," I told her, fighting the urge to embrace a creature as ravishing as her. "You get yourself back to bed little lady."

She crossed her arms. "Please don't act like you don't want it either. It's all written in you."

"Beth, have you seen yourself during all this? There's no way any man wouldn't desire you. I'm too old, too bad of a role model for you and your-"

She cut me off. "I bet you think I'm too young for you right? Well, I'm too young to have the walking dead rise up, take close to everyone I know, and put me and what's left of my family on the run, always struggling to stay one step ahead of them. I want to _live_, Daryl, and I want _you. _I don't want to die without... experiencing it. What's the point of life if you can't enjoy it?"

"Beth," I said, still fighting off the urge of thinking painfully wrong thoughts. "Your dad ain't gonna like this-"

She cut me off again, but this time with a sudden and unexpected kiss. Not just a friendly kiss, but a passionate and desiring one. That was enough to turn me on. I couldn't fight something that we'd both wanted for a while now. A tongue thrust into wetness after a two year absence... yeah, I'd wanted something for a long time. Exploring her petite little body with my hands, I realized that she was perfect. She was lean and curvy where it counted, according to what my hands were telling me, and both the feel and look of her were starting to do things to my dick. As we finally broke our kiss, she looked at me with those beautiful blue eyes, staring back at mine.

"Daddy won't find out here," she said in the voice of an angel. "We can make it one night, or we can continue in the future. Your call."

One night? Hell no. "Darlin',"I said to her, "If you come to a Dixon expecting a one night stand, you're going to be seriously mistaken. A Dixon wants it all."

And then we got down to business.

**AN: More explicit smut comes next chapter. Figured I'd give you a little teaser before the big show. If you think I'm progressing things between Daryl/Beth too fast or too slow, just let me know in a review.**

**As always R&R! It keeps my fingers typing.**

**-Jokerang**


	11. Forced to Start Living

"So, is everything in working order?"

The Governor looked at the behemoth besides him with glee. Normally such a machine of terrible power would not be given to an ordinary man by the troops of Fort Benning, but the Governor was an exception, because he was no ordinary man. After meeting Hanson for the first time, the two men found they had more alike than they thought they did and quickly became friends. He could tell Hanson was attracted to people with a lust for power, and that just fit the Governor perfectly. The little 'accident' with the group Rick had sent had done even more to cement their friendship, and their trust as well. Now he was going to be loaned one of Benning's more prized possessions, along with a willing crew to boot.

"Yep, just about all the controls work," said Shumpert, who'd had a stint with the Army in his younger years. "Crew knows more than I do, though. But I wouldn't worry about their loyalty; that massacre of their friends put enough fire in their bellies to last three decades."

"Good," the Governor responded. A tank was now his. Now it was time to speak privately with Major Hanson.

He found the man in his office, planning something as ever. "Hello," said the Governor. "Mind if I come in?"

"Not at all," said the former Ranger, "Have a seat."

One settled down, the Governor went through it in his head. _Focus, Philip, _he thought. _Your words will decide where this man's loyalties lie._

"Hanson," he said, gathering all his confidence, "I need to tell you something." And he whispered in his ear the secret he'd had to hide for now, but could not be kept away any longer.

Hanson's face turned a big beefy red. "You son of a bitch," he muttered to himself. "If my men get to hear what you just told me, they would-"

The Governor cut him off, telling him his big plans for the future. Plans, he empathized, would only come to light if the good Major continued to provide his support and assistance. He finished his argument with "Is it alright?"

"Yeah, Hanson replied. "It is alright."

The two tyrants then went to the fort's bar for a few drinks. They would need them.

* * *

**Daryl POV**

I was having the best night of my life in years.

After telling Beth what a Dixon wanted, I pulled her in for another kiss. While she put her energies into keeping my lips satisfied, I took my greedy hands and did a second exploration of her body. Putting one hand on her shoulder, I used the other hand to reach up inter her tank top and gently take her breast and massage it. If she hadn't been kissing me so passionately I could've sworn she'd have let out a little moan. But there would be more opportunities for that later. I slowly guided her own hand up to my chest, letting her fascinate herself with my chest hair and even some of the scars of my childhood that had never gone away. She was ripping off my shirt and I quickly responded in kind, yanking hers off as fast as I could.

With our shirts gone and on the floor, our attention turned to our pants. I took the lead, reaching down her jeans and sticking a hand inside, playing with those ever-so intimate parts in an almost ticklish manner. Beth threw her head back and gave off moans of pleasure that were becoming more frequent and louder. I had no idea whether Beth had ever had an orgasm in her life or not, but either way she was clearly enjoying what I could do to her. She began to lay herself down on the cold, hard floor, and I proceeded to do the same, while trying to undress both of us as fast as I could. I briefly considered what kinds of foreplay I could employ right here and now, but decided against it. Beth needed to learn the basics before we could move on to the more complex but also fun stuff. _One step at a time_, I thought to myself as we each took a moment to admire each other's bare bodies.

I could tell that she liked me for who I was. I never saw myself as a handsome or attractive man, but Beth clearly did. Her hands kept rubbing my face and she even pinched my cheek once. I tried to tell her otherwise, but she just kissed me again and said "I already told you, you're sooo cute when you show pain. It one of things that's attractive in you." She proceeded to do it again, somewhat to my dismay. Her other hand kept making circles around my muscles, scars and tattoos, admiring them for what they were, as if I was some kind of beautiful predator with wings clipped.

She might have thought I was quite the stud, but I felt myself losing myself in this bout of sexual admiration. Beth was eighteen, and that, Merle said after a night spent in a strip club, was the perfect age for a bang. I'd wondered what he meant, as I was not the person to be hitting on teenage girls, but now I could fully grasp what Merle's words meant. Lying there in nothing but her underwear, Beth was both a aging girl and a young woman at the same time. She had the sweetness of a teen but the signs of womanhood developing, if not completed. As my hands had told and anticipated earlier, her body was perfect. It almost ashamed me to be the one who took this angel's virginity, but those thoughts were being pushed aside. No point in ruining a good night with petty matters like guilt and shame, especially when she was the one who desired it first.

"You happy?" I asked her. A sort of guilt-ridding question.

"Of course." The perfect voice replied back like she was still expecting bigger things.

So we resumed. I kissed her neck, and went down to her collarbone, and worked my way down to her flat and very soft stomach. Her hands, for the most part, seemed content to rub the area between my own legs, and I could tell she clearly had never done that before. Her little hands began to go faster and faster, and it was working miracles down there. My own hands got busy taking off her bra, and her face just looked into my own and smiled. She really was beautiful. I wanted to tell her but didn't know if this little affair was going to be a full relationship yet or not.

"Okay," I said to her as my fingers slid inside her, making her moan again, "this is when it happens. You know we could both just call it a day. I know you enjoyed it. I can tell."

"Go on." she replied back. "Make me _feel_ again."

So I pulled myself up, put her legs into position, braced myself for impact, and thrust into her.

Beth's cries of pleasure were so loud I could have sworn that every living thing within a three-mile radius would have been woken up if it wasn't for the fact the doors were closed.

* * *

Afterwards, she'd enjoyed it the first time so much she'd wanted to go again, and we had a couple more rounds before her body couldn't take anymore and we'd both fell on the floor.

Now here we were, laying in each other's embraces, with a mess of clothes on, just using each other to feel warm and secure.

I noticed a scar on Beth, on her wrist. It was faint but it had all the signs of a cutting. "Girl, don't tell me you tried to off yourself one day?"

"Actually I did," She said. "Though I don't think you were there when it happened."

I racked my brain to remember what she was talking about. "Is this when I got pissed about Sophia in the barn and I isolated myself for a while?"

"Yep. Actually, that's why I tried to kill myself: the walkers in the barn. After the way Shane brutally showed us that there was no cure, I lost myself. We were living just to survive, against seemingly hopeless odds. Maggie and Lori did their best to talk me out of it, but their approaches didn't seem to apply to anything. Then there was something Andrea said to me. _'The pain doesn't go away, you just learn to live with it.' _I still tried to cut myself later that day. but I only drew a little bit of blood before freaking out."

I took a few seconds to absorb Andrea's words to the girl. They were wise words, and they could've been the story of my life, had someone told it to me ten years earlier. I then looked at the scar. It was hauntingly beautiful, in its own way. Unlike all of mine.

"Beth," I said, holding her a little tighter, "You're not some goth-emo whatever crying out for attention. You and I both went through a lot... okay, maybe me more than you. But you got past it and I really admire that. Besides, you said you wanted to live, and, well, we both enjoyed ourselves tonight, didn't we?" That got a weak smile from her, but it was enough to convince me I'd made her feel satisfied.

"If you want to know all about wanting to kill yourself," I told her, "You should check out this wound." I turned her over to show her a particularly nasty line running down my back. As she curiously traced it with a finger, I began to recall that sad day.

When Merle was about twenty, " I said, "He came home super drunk. It was wasn't his first time, but this time he'd picked up cocaine, meth, and God knows whatever drugs he'd tired that night. My dad found the stash of stuff, and they proceeded to get involved in the family tirade to end all family tirades. They both cursed and yelled at each other about how the other was the scumbag of the family, and how each of the others was a failure. Then they got knives out and started a real, physical fight. I was maybe thirteen, and I tried to do my best to pull each of them off the other, but I couldn't. Then my dad threw Merle off of him, went to me, and said 'This is what you get for getting in my damn business' and slashed me across the back before Merle got him off of me, and the two kept fighting for maybe ten minutes afterwards I'm still surprised neither of them did that night. And that's you appreciate the family you've got left: all of mine save one didn't give a fuck 'bout me, and the one that did got taken from me by that Governor son of a bitch. Now I've got none."

"But you have us," commented Beth. "Me and everyone else. We're a new family. Not necessary one tied by blood, but we've been together so long we might as well be. Rick, Carol and all the rest."

That was wise beyond her years and also very true. Bound together by fate, we'd gone from a ragtag bunch of misfits to a well organized survivalists that had just taken in even more people from the rivals down the lane because their leader obviously didn't give two shits about what happened to them. We all shared sorrows, good times, and secrets.

Secrets...

I hesitated. I'd spent half an hour teaching Beth all the basic sex positions, and then preformed them with her. Twice. But did I know her well enough to disclose to her one of my biggest sources of anguish? I mean, I needed to tell _someone_, anyone really, but I would've preferred someone I could trust and believe would support me, like Carol. But Carol wasn't around.

In the end, I decided to tell Beth. We'd already shared saliva, semen, and God knows what other bodily fluids. Why not a secret too?

"Beth, what I'm about to tell you, this stays between you and me as much as our little fling does, right? Don't breathe a word of it anyone else. Especially not Rick. He'll either think I'm seeing things like he saw Lori or he'll go off on a wild witch hunt, and neither of those things we need right now. Got it?"

"Yes."

"You promise me?"

"I do."

"Ok, here's the deal. I think we have a traitor in the prison as we speak."

Her eyes widened, lids pulling well clear of the irises.

"My guess is one of the hitchhikers, Jay or even one of the Woodbury people deliberately fucked up our parley with Fort Benning. If it was one of the Woodbury people, the must've slipped out past our guard and informed the Governor somehow, and then the Governor did his thing. If it was one of the other three, they shot up one of the guards during our walk out of their and then pinned the blame on Karen. It's not the who that concerns me as much as the why, though."

"But... why would someone do that?" Beth seemed worried. "we've been much easier on those people than the Governor ever was. You'd think they'd be grateful?"

"Nope, not all of them," I said. Over the past few weeks, Woodbury people kept griping about how they preferred living in a safe town rather than an intimidating, dark, and not fully secure prison. "Simplest answer would be that the Governor employed them to mess things up for us."

"Well, if he was one of the three that went with you to Fort Benning, his own actions endangered his own life as well."

"I thought about that. My bet is that if it was one of the three, he counted on me and Rick to save his ass. Maybe he had some kind of ace up his sleeve, but we'll never know. That's about it, I just needed someone to talk about this to."

Beth nodded, and then the two of us looked around to make sure no one had spotted us or were watching, and then we proceeded to get dressed and sneak back to our cells. Then I remembered something.

"Beth," I said to her, "are you won't get pregnant or something?"

She shook her head. 'Maggie gets birth control on every run she goes on. You know, for her and Glenn. I know where they're kept, and I can just use some whenever."

Alright," I told her as I escorted her back to the bunk of her cell. "Take care of yourself, you heard me?"

She smirked to herself. "Yea, I heard. Love ya," she told me after giving me a final kiss for the night. It was the first time someone told me they loved me in a very long time.

I went back to the guardtower and took watch for the rest of the night. The walkers didn't seem all that restless, so I ended up napping there, admiring the moon and stars.

However, it wasn't so peaceful when I woke up the next day.

**AN: Yeah, smut. I'm no expert at writing it, but I hope you enjoy anyways.**

**As always, rate and review folks!**

**Mexican-Canadian: Thank you for all your support!**

**Guest Taryn: I will get your cameo soon. Trust me, I'll get it done.**

**Wizadora1257: Aww tanks. You're magical too :D**

**Candra 'wolfgal97: I enjoy Daryl whumps as well. As to my first person POV, it's the POV I find myself writing in most of the time, whether it's for fanfiction or English classes. Hope you enjoyed this latest chapter!**


	12. Challenge

I woke up to the sounds of walkers growling.

I wasn't surprised: I had spent the night in the guardtower, after all. Despite everything that could have been there to prevent sleep, I ended up taking a nice, long nap in there anyways. So when I heard a walker's grunts and growls, I went to the rails, expecting one of them to be caught in the fences or something, and it was struggling to get out by making all sorts of walker noises.

It was anything but.

This was the original courtyard that the group had secured when we'd first seen the prison and decided it was good for the taking, so it was kind of symbolically ironic that it would be the first place in the prison to be reclaimed by the dead. it was also where a number of our vehicles were as well. It looked like there were just a few of those things at first, but then I realized that there were a lot of them. And by a lot I mean herd size, maybe fifty or so.

Right in our own backyard.

I rushed out of that guardtower as carefully and fast as I could. I spotted the Whiz keeping an eye on the walkers on one side of a gate, along with his camping tent. This guy was the only person to reject a cell in favor of his or her own mode of sleeping. We all thought he was crazy but he was fine. Besides, it was one extra person to do the nighttime guard duty watch.

"Hey, man," I said to him. "You have any idea what the hell happen here with those things?"

Whiz shook his head. "I was sleeping as much as you were. First thing I woke up to was walkers clawing the gate separating me from the them. Since then I've been keeping an eye on them to make sure this place doesn't break anytime soon. Rick's talking with everyone else at breakfast about this by the way. I told him that you were out here, so he won't be surprised if you just show in late or anything."

"Okay, thanks," I told him as I proceeded to head on down to a cafeteria where Rick and most of the original group along with Sasha, Tyreese, Trapdoor, Jay, and a number of the Woodbury kids good with guns were conversing about how they were going to deal with the threat right next to them. "... we'll need Sasha to take the people who need marksmanship training to the rooftops to do that. Meanwhile, Glenn, Michonne and I will go in through the gateway and handle them close up. And Daryl..."

I walked right in as Rick was mentioning my name for his plant to re-clear the courtyard. Except for Beth and Rick, everyone had a look of mild confusion on their faces.

"Overslept on guard duty," I told everyone there. "Did I miss anything?"

"You were just about to," said Rick rather sarcastically. "Daryl, you're going to be securing the perimeter of the courtyard. Anything that tries to get in and join the herd, that's your responsibility. You'll have Tyresse and Carl to help you out with that. The rest of you will stay with Whiz and remain at the gate just in case anything goes wrong. Let's go grab our respective weapons and meet back here in fifteen minutes. Got it? Good. I'll see you here."

One by one the folks began to head back to their cells and grab their signature weapons. Rick had his trusty Python revolver and knife. Tyresse collected his hammer, Carl his silenced handgun, Glenn a Mossburg that he had accustomed himself to, Michonne her katana, and Sasha her sniper rifle. I, for the most part, got the things I had used for so long now they almost seemed a part of me: crossbow, hunting knife, and the Glock I had brought with me to that Fort Benning disaster.

As I loaded the last of my things and prepared to leave off for the day's exciting chore of getting rid of walkers, someone tapped me and pulled me to the side. I relaxed. It was Beth.

"Hey," she said to me, her dreamy eyes looking into mine. "I just wanted... to say thank you. For last night. It was amazing, I never knew it would be that much fun."

I smiled back at her. "You'll never have to say thank you to me for anything," I said back to her. "Is this an invitation for a second date or somethin'?"

"Yes," she whispered in my ear, so only the tow of us could hear. "Same time, same place. That good with you?"

"It's all good to me," I replied with a grin, patting her on the back as I went to meet up with Carl and Tyreese for our part of the plan.

Tyresse said hello to me, but Carl didn't. Ever since that incident at lunch a few days back, Carl had silently refused to talk to me or just interact with me in any which way whatsoever. Rick had tried to cheer him up since then but it seemed like the kid either needed some alone time or someone other than his dad to talk to him. The fact that I was taking his place as Beth's main male interaction didn't help things one bit. Everyone knew Carl liked Beth throughout the winter but she just couldn't see herself dating a preteen four years her junior. Carl simply didn't have a chance, and he knew it. And he was taking out his silent anger treatment on me.

I decided to break the ice with this kid. "Hey," I said to him. He just looked back with a stone cold view. "Are you still mad at me for punching you a few days back?"

Carl stared at me for a few seconds, then rubbed his head and frowned.

"No," he said. "Not anymore. I can sort of get why you were mad. I shouldn't have said that to you. Karen was a good person."

"And I shouldn't have hit you either. I'm sorry, got it?" Carl finally smiled at me, the first time in days.

"It's all good. Now let's go kill some walkers," he said as the two groups of three were let out through the gates and proceeded to retake that courtyard.

While Rick and his group went head on into the mini-herd, the other two and I headed to the left, killing walkers as we went. Tyreese used his hammer to handle any of those things that got to close to either me or Carl as we aimed, fired a headshot, and reloaded to attack again. Carl almost got in the grasp of a walker that we hadn't seen coming from our right, but I quickly took out my Glock and let off a few rounds, sending his head all over the place. Rick, Michonne and Glenn held up their end of the plan pretty well, as the trio cleared a path of zombies brought down by revolver, shotgun, and katana. There were close encounters walkers made on all three of them, but usually what happened was that either one of the other three saved their ass in time or Sasha or Jay, sniping from a rooftop, brought down whatever threat there was. From the gate, Trapdoor, Beth and Maggie provided what covering fire they could, scoring a few kills here and there.

Then a ugly hand grabbed my shoulder, and I turned around to see the pus-filled whites of the eyes of a walker. I shook it off of me and kicked in the abdomen, giving me some breathing room. The walker got up and roared. Before either of us could make a move on the other, and shot rang out. The walker's head leaked blood and other brain matter, than dropped sideways. I looked to who my savior was. It was Jay, sniping from his rooftop.

"Y'know, that's the second time I've saved your ass," Jay yelled at me, smirking.

"Whatever," I sent back to him as I pulled another valuable arrow from a walker's skull and stabbed it in another. "Let's get this over with."

* * *

After finishing cleaning out that courtyard for the second time, we'd all helped each other in lifting the bodies, taking them outside of the prison perimeter, and burned them in mass graves.

We'd found yet another fence cut. This hole was a lot bigger than the one I'd found from the first run with Beth, but it had the same fashion as the other one. There were a bunch of bolt cutter marks all over the whole where these walkers had came from. It had to have been the Governor and his men again, with their van full of walkers. Judging from a pair of tire tracks near the whole, my guess was that during the night, they'd slipped by, quietly cut the hole, put the van in place, quickly let the back open, wait for all the walkers to get out, then drive off as fast as they could.

The Governor was really becoming a pain in the ass.

We could handle these attacks fairly easily, but it was putting a lot of strains and stress on all of us. These walkers cost us bullets, time and energy. It was obvious that this was all part of some kind of wearing down process, trying to soften up our defenses little by little. Another two attacks, over the next day but with less walkers, showed just how much of a toll this was really taking on us.

Physically it was grueling. Psychologically, it was grueling as well. Whiz and Trapdoor were going at it from time to time. So were Whiz and Tyreese. Whiz, in fact, was starting to piss everyone off, even people like me and kids like Carl. Insults here and there had become commonplace for all of us but the way he was sending them left and right was becoming too much for anyone. For example, he flung 'nerdy Asian kid' at Glenn several times when Glenn had a plan for clearing another section of the tombs that proved far better than Whiz's plan for the same purpose. He got away with it the first time but not the second. The fact that he'd spitted 'Asian lovebird' at Maggie when she'd tried to help defend her fiancée's position didn't help matters either. They'd have all come to blows if Beth and I hadn't stepped in and managed to pacify the three of them. I even got Whiz and Glenn to shake hands respectfully, even though Maggie was still upset. However, this was for not just their benefit but everyone else's as well. _None of that shit_, I told them. _Not while I'm watching._

Then there was another incident where, in the wee hours of the morning. Tyreese, Whiz, and I were all up on the catwalk, taking watch and preparing ourselves for the next raid. Even though I'd just had another go-round with Beth the night before, Rick still insisted that I go on this run because, well, our little affair was not something we wanted anyone knowing. I had really no options but to comply. It was our turn to gather supplies.

Whiz was whining and complaining about everything: being disturbed from his sleep, wasting gas, and potentially being eaten by walkers, etcetera fucking etcetera. I was about to tell him to stow it but Tyreese got to it first.

"Would you put a fucking sock in it, alright?" he hissed.

Whiz responded by using the most unpardonable word there is for a black person. Tyreese, unsurprisingly, began to go ballistic and got into a fight with him. I let him beat him up for a few minutes, because Whiz deserved it. Eventually things were getting too violent, even for me, so I had to go in and break up the two of them. Only problem was, when I pulled each of them from the other, both Tyreese and the Whiz decided to punch and kick me. This could not stand. I grabbed Tyreese first, putting him the hardest headlock I could muster, given the man was a good 50-75 pounds heavier than me, and threw him on top on an old mattress, one of those that Merle had torn apart in an attempt to look for drugs. Then I got a hold of the Whiz, despite all of his protests, cursing, and fussing. After calming both of them down, I proceeded to give them a nice long lecture about not arguing, not picking on each other, not using racial slurs of any kind, and generally just keeping all of our shit together in one bucket, because if this was how we were just going for a supply run, imagine what could happen in the not so forgiving future.

"So sit down, shut up, and start acting like you were born with some balls," I roared at them, "both of you!"

We continued loading the car and drove off to our destination in silence. I'd made my point, but was still fuming inside. We weren't supposed to be fighting each other and falling to pieces. That could only help the Governor. And that sent suspicion crossing my mind again: we had a spy, a pro-Governor person within our midst. And I was growing more and more certain who it just might be.

One good thing did result from the incident. After raiding our destination for all we could carry, we encountered a small group of walkers blocking our path. I gave the word and suddenly the three of us were all over these walkers, spilling their blood and blasting their brains. We were roaring like lions as we fought them, and I was screaming the loudest of all.


	13. Calm And A Storm

There was a lull. The raids stopped for the time being.

Everyone in the prison, from Judith to Hershel, was relieved at the break we'd received. Some of us caught up on lost sleep. Some of us (including me) began to spend the nights staying up late, playing cards and drinking games with the alcohol supply. Still others preferred to continue life as they always had, like Rick. He was always found fuming over some petty issue or matter. But for the most part, we all enjoyed the respite that was being given to us because, well, we didn't know how long it would last.

It couldn't be forever, even though we'd like it to.

The calm before the storm.

* * *

On this particular night, Beth and I were out on one of our, ahem, 'night time guard duties'. These we fitted whenever we could, and more often than not it was her that was the instigator. She'd quietly wake me up at night, drag me out into the night and off we went. Sometimes once the fun and games were over, I'd top off a lone walker or two so that no one would get suspicious and suspect I was doing whatever except what I'd told folks.

These times we'd spent together were reaching the point where we'd unconsciously created a routine: we started with a bunch of kissing games and teasing of each other, proceeded by one of us being pushed against a wall. Who that person was usually the one who just happened to be closer to the wall. After that, I'd play around with those perky little tits of hers and get her all excited and fired up, and she'd do the same with my nether regions, which could turn me one in a heartbeat. Then we'd strip each other, taking the time admire each others bodies. I loved her smooth, pale skin while she adored my body, not only for the well-defined muscles I'd acquired over the years but also the imperfections, the scars and tattoos. We took turns also exploring what our mouths were capable of doing to the other, and trust me she was strangely better suited to using hers that I was using mine during sexual playtime. Finally, I'd insert myself into her in one of several ways, and then we'd do it again. And again. And again till we'd both had enough.

Beth truly was my complete opposite. Everything about her, stood in sheer contrast to everything about me. She was raised in a rural paradise with all the love and support she could get, while I'd struggled wherever my dad decided to move into and had little love from that son of a bitch. Her body was like heaven with it's perfect paleness and unexplainably beautiful face, while mine was covered in the damages of the past and present and I never really knew if I was even considered attractive until now. Being new to sex, she wanted it a lot and insisted that our lovemaking go slowly and very sweet - kind of a reflection of the person she was. I, on the other hand, didn't really need the sex as much as she did but when I forced myself to, I was a complete animal. I lost a part of myself with her, taking her to the limits and building up the fire inside of her until she cried out my name as loud as she could, and even then her voice was incorruptible, even though I'd defiled every other inch of her in the process.

It was something both of us just took as it was. Our stark, almost alienating differences.

However, throughout all of the breast play, moaning and groaning, heat and wetness, the numerous sex positions and all the rest, that was one thing both Beth and I had in mind while we were out on these times together: do it now, and enjoy it for what is its.

In the end, though, we usually made our sex tough and coarse. It was the way people fucked when there was a war going on and your life could be ended at any moment, whether it be by walker bite, bullet, stabbing or anything else. Urgent, brutal and with little grace to it. Everything was usually becoming raw, raw, raw.

However, this night I caught something in my eye.

On this particular occasion, we'd decided to experiment with mouth tasting her insides before moving on to my handiwork. I had just finished another wonderful fingering of her sweet, wet pussy and had proceeded to teach her how to properly execute a knee-trembler when the matter I saw became quite a bit more urgent. "Stop for a minute," I told Beth.

"Stop as in we're changing positions, or..."

"No. Just stop. I think there's something going on outside."

I looked at what I needed to. If someone had caught us, we both would've died. I was pressed against Beth, hands on her shoulders to keep her upright, while she in turn had her arms and breasts pressed against the glass. We were facing away from the main part of the prison, but for fuck's sake it wasn't enough to cover all of us if someone really wanted to take a closer look at the guardtower.

"Beth," I told her, trying my best not to disappoint her, 'I think we're going to have to call it quits for tonight. I think the whole prison could be in real danger soon."

"But why? I don't see what's wrong." She clearly did not like being disrupted from our playtime.

"Just trust me on this one."

Abrupt withdrawal. Clothes flung back on as fast as we could.

As she headed off, I took the pair of binoculars that was left at the guardtower for seeing off into the distance and looked into them to see if my eyes were really deceiving me. They weren't.

It was a fucking tank.

Glenn had told us about how Rick had been stuck inside of one as he tried to hide himself from a big ol' herd of walkers straight in the middle of Atlanta. If walkers could force a tank to come to a standstill, then there was really little that could stop those things. I had to rub my eyes several times before finally believing what I was seeing. And the tank wasn't the only thing coming. I could tell that at least three military trucks were escorting the damn thing because of the headlights they had in the night and the occasional sound of machine gun fire, most likely taking out the random walker here or there.

Seems like our old friend Major Hanson put together a little welcoming committee.

I thought I was going to have to be the one who alerted everyone else, but as I got back to cell block C, I realized that I didn't need to. Everyone was either getting their guns ready or packing their bags in the event that we had to leave here and now. I wondered how they knew already, but then realized that the watch was stationed on the other side of the prison. If I could see the tank from the guardtower opposite from it, the watch knew fully that this monster and it's cronies were on its way. Glenn pulled me aside and gave me my crossbow and what appeared to be a Galil assault rifle and led me to a room where Rick, Jay, Whiz and Trapdoor were also cleaning out their rifles and loading out as much ammo as they could. The first thing that came into my mind was that everyone here was either an expert with firearms, an expert with explosives, or both. I didn't know what Rick and Glenn were planning for dealing with the tank but I could tell it was going to be very ballsy and tricky.

Glenn had a makeshift map of the prison and the forests around it and used several toy cars to represent the tank and its escorts. "Attacking the damn thing head on is complete suicide," said Glenn in a teacher-like fashion. "Bullets aren't going to do any good, and even that grenade launcher we picked up from the battle with Woodbury is unlikely to make a dent in all of the vehicles either. If the six of us can slip by and get inside the tank and incapacitate it's crew, we're good. But we're going to need a distraction to buy us some time to get close enough to the tank. This is where Tyreese and Sasha come in."

Without warning, Glenn took another toy car and placed it in front of the other cars. A dozen or so Lego figures were dropped and all around them.

"Merle actually had a ingenious plan when he went on his assassination mission, "said Glenn, trying to fight back any harsh feelings he still had for the man. "Tyreese and Sasha have volunteered to take one of our cars and, driving around several times around the prison, attract as many walkers as they can, and lead them to the escort vehicles and distract them with our herd. While they're tied down with that, the six of us go together and sneak up to the tank from the only side they're not going to expect it."

"Which is?" I asked Glenn.

"Behind it."

* * *

In front of the others in the night, I led our little bunch of merry men off to face the biggest threat since either that horde on Hershel's farm or the Governor attacks on the prison.

Tyreese and Sasha held their end of the bargain pretty well. they took longer than expected, but they still got a fairly large herd - forty or so walkers - and drove as fast as they could to the front of the trucks and then ditched the vehicles as fast as they could. The first of the trucks had just reached the gate of the north side of the prison when the walkers began to attack. One of them grabbed the barrel of the machine gun of the truck, pulling it with all its might. It didn't last long. a couple dozen rounds to the face and the walker slumped back down to earth, with not much left of its head. This did nothing to deter the others. Soon walkers were all over the three escort trucks, and their drivers and gun crews wasted no time putting them down one after the other. Some were beheaded by machine gun fire, others ran over by the trucks attempting to move back and forth, without much success.

One of the walkers, distancing itself from the main herd, spotted us under the treetops and attempted to move it's best towards us and try to get itself a meal. Next thing it knew, the tank came and rolled over it, squashing it like a bug, but the walker served another purpose. Some part of it must have got caught in the tank trreds or something, because the big steaming machine came to a halt and moved a little bit in each direction, trying to get out of it's current predicament. That was our cue, and Glenn made a hand gesture for the rest of us to follow him and get behind the tank, but at a safe distance.

I began sizing up the tank. It looked like the biggest kind that was made before the world's end. An Abrams, or something like that. All I knew about it - all that we needed to know - was that it was big, it was deadly, and if it got to the prison in time it would make mincemeat of the folks inside if we weren't fast enough.

Time to get this shit over with.

"Whiz! Jay!" Glenn was beginning to give out orders to us. "Keep going around our area and make completely sure that there's no enemies that might try and interfere with us. The trucks are pretty occupied with the walker horde we've got for them, and there's not too many walkers in those forests thanks to that, but for fuck's sake just watch out anyways."

I watched them go. I, for the most part, was relieved that Whiz wasn't on my back anymore. Glenn then turned to the rest of us.

"You three are on me. We're going to scale that thing and drop a couple of grenades down the hole. We just need to reach the latch that the crew uses to get in and out."

I noted how Rick was being bossed around like he was one of the team, but seemed strongly accepting of it. Then again, it was Glenn who was doing all of the planning of this mission and the schematics of it, while Rick, it seemed, had been unsure of what to do and let someone else take the reins for now. The good new as that were beginning to scale the tank. The bad news?

Those trucks in the front weren't the only enemies left.

Another truck pulled up nest to where we were and out came a dozen or so Army Rangers, carrying seven inch black blades, out and ready for blood. They charged at us with sounds such as "Hostiles!" and "Kick their asses!" and "Kill 'em!"

Five of them were on top of the tank before any of us had got our shit together. They might have ended our lives then and there had they decided to go with the silent method of execution rather than the gung-ho way of making an entrance. My response was to let them have it with the Galil. The thing was, the tank was their baby and they had no intention of harming it. Hence the knifes as a precaution. As for us, we were their to damage it any way we could. So I let my rifle rip.

The five went down, a grand mixture of overconfidence (theirs) and ruthlessness (ours). The truck immediately made a fast U-turn and drove off as fast as it well could. I could hear the driver making comments about why his men had brought knifes to a motherfucking gun fight, and what were they supposed to do now, huh?

Several of the soldiers did manage to slip into the woods, however. Trapdoor and Glenn got off the tank, apparently to flush them out. As they did, Glenn tossed me a trio of grenades stringed together. "Get some help from the Pineapple family here."

"And me," said Rick. The more the merrier.

Once the two of us reached the turret, Rick said, "Daryl, my son."

"Yea, what about Carl?"

"Someone 's gotta mentor him, guide if I don't make it. Will you?"

"Dude, are you worried about your death in a time like this? We've been on so many supply runs and-"

"I've," Rick was letting a tear or two drop. "I've been a poor father."

"He knows that. He knows you still love him anyways, and he loves you. Poor father? My dad wrote the book on that shit. But at least you two have each other in this world, when I just lost the one family I had left. Now, there's a crew of these sons of bitches in this tank, and every minute we spend having this little heart-to-heart is another minute they get to figure out how to deal with us. So let's skip the lovey-dovey crap and get to work shall we?"

Rick looked back at me with the face he had when we would Merle's hand on that rooftop in Atlanta.

"Blunt as ever, Daryl," he said, "and in your own way, wise."

"Cheers."

I pulled the pin on one of the grenades, opened the hatch to the tank, and let explosives do their trick.

**AN:**

**There will be a major character death in the next chapter. PM or review my your guess as to who it is and I'll send you a message with an e-hug.**

**Also, I wanted to tell everyone how I got the idea for Daryl/Beth. I was watching Arrow in the Doorpost with my girlfriend, and half the comments were either how beautiful and perfect Emily Kinney was or how much Norman Reedus was a hottie and a total stud. I forgot about it till I went onto Fanfiction and needed an idea for a Walking Dead story. My girlfriend's comments were the first thing to come to mind, and I wrapped my mind on the idea.**

**Also I changed the rating to M, I think it's reached that stage.**


	14. Fallen Hero

While dropping those grenades down the hatch, I could hear the voices of the crew inside. One of them was saying 'Oh shit' and another managed to cry out "Holy Mother of-" before the grenades did there thing.

It was like a couple of drum banging in Hell.

Rick opened the hatch lid to access the damage and clean up. It was not a pretty sight. In addition to the whole inside of the tank being blacked and smoking, the grenades had killed at least two of the crew and had either wounded or hazed all the rest. These were the ones that attempted to get out and do what they needed to do, but Rick was up and ready for them.

He seized the first of them, a clean-cut man who looked to be in his thirties, and flipped him off the turret and onto the main part of the tank where the bodies of the five we'd killed still lay. He wasted precious seconds getting those bodies off of him, and by the time he did I was already on top of him. A hard foot in a boot to the chest meant he'd stay down permanently. Rick was already grabbing the next man, who'd looked like half his face had been burned off, and was struggling to control him, while at the same time using the pistol in his hand to kill off another crew member coming out of the tank. The fallen comrade slumped back in the machine, and for the finishing touch, Rick had the one he was wrestling with, put the arm holding the gun so that the barrel was facing his chin, and pulled the trigger. He managed to mumble a few shouts before his life was ended suddenly and violently.

I, for one, was impressed as hell. Who knew Rick could bring out the violent warrior in him so unexpectedly and viciously? I had known Rick for quite some time now, and knew what he was capable of, but rarely did I see him out in a full-blown rage like this. Most of the time was as a calm, somewhat soft-spoken man, but when he wanted and needed to be he was the guy for whom actions spoke louder than words. In this world, words didn't always get you places. Actions did. And since Rick and I were both men of action but in different ways, it should've been no surprise that we were the ones to come out on top and take over.

"Daryl, behind you!"

Rick was shouting at me. I quickly turned around and saw what it was.

There were two men, both with rifles aimed at us. The fact that they didn't wear some sort of military issue uniform indicated that these men weren't Hanson's boys but in fact worked for the Governor. One of them, who I'd never seen before, was dressed in jeans, a brown but stained by blood jacket and had a black bandanna to cover his face. The other, a black man, I could have sworn was at the prison during the Governors attacks on the prison. The look in their eyes shown death and red. It showed that whatever they wanted to do, all that they wanted to do, was kill us.

And the weapons they had show they were ready to do just that.

Before I could react, shell shocked as I was, Rick's voice commanded , "GET DOWN NOW!"

I did, and soon I could hear bullets raking all across the tank's surface. Maybe the soldiers wanted to see their tank intact, but the Governors men obviously didn't give a damn. All they cared about was results.

Then Rick pulled off one of the most insane and jaw dropping moves I'd ever seen him do. He stood up quickly, pistol aimed and ready, and fired off three shots all at once. The man I didn't know dropped hard, the rounds stitching his head and neck. But the black man continued to fire, and Rick was forced to drop and use me for cover. Fortunately not a single bullet hit either of us. For a minute this went on. Eventually Rick got lower and whispered something in my ear. "Take my pistol. Now."

"What you-" I questioned him.

Before I got an answer, Rick got up, took out his knife, and did the craziest jump he could have done. I take it back, _this_ was the craziest thing I saw Rick Grimes ever do. The man on the ground panicked and fired off one too many shots, which all seemed to be misses. Soon Rick and the other man were on the ground, wrestling like it was some kind of WWE match. I pulled my shit together, got on the ground, and prepared my gun In case Rick failed to eliminate the threat. But it turned out that I wouldn't need to. I heard the distinctive sound of a knife slashing a man's throat, and the Governor henchman fell to the earth, dead as a doornail.

"Done," said Rick.

I took a quick analysis of the battleground. Not a single walker in sight, and the only other enemies were humans, and all of these were moaning and grunting in pain. The sounds of the dying and mortally wounded.

Also mortally wounded, it turned out, was Rick.

He suddenly slouched in my arms, and I could feel blood leaking out from between my fingers. Laying him down, I realized that all of those shots hadn't, as I hoped, gone wild. There were at least a dozen rounds in him, in the chest, arms and legs, and his clothes were getting more and more crimson by the second.

Officer Friendly, the man who'd kept our group going through hell and high water for nearly a year now, was a total goner.

"No no no no no," I muttered to myself. "I'll get you back to the prison. Hershel and Jay will be able to get you up and back in shape. I know it!"

"That's nice of you," said Rick, his voice calm and revealing of the fact that he had now accepted his fate. "but I don't think it's going to help me. I can feel it... there are too many organs inside me collapsing and failing as we speak... this is the end."

"Bullshit. You're the leader. Come on, we've been through worse that this. You got stuck in a tank, we could've died at the CDC, that farm of Hershel's got overrun, the battles with Woodbury, and so much more. Don't quit on me now!"

Rick kept silent through all this and gave a weak smile.

"You're the leader now. It's been a good life," he said with a small amount of struggle. "Even if there was the end of the world to see. I'll miss everyone, but I'll see them again. My wife, my son... my friends, my fellow survivors, even Shane..."

He spitted the last of these words out, along with a gallon of blood.

"And you, Daryl... It's been a privilege to know you and for who you are, even if it was a short amount of time. You're in charge now. Take care of them. Take care of Carl. And Judith!"

Those were his last words, taking all of his remaining strength to say them. Then he fell back. The former sheriff known to the people who knew him as Rick Grimes died in my arms. I had about two seconds to digest all this and come to terms with the fact that our former leader was no more. Then two things happened to remind me that the world hadn't quite ended for me yet. First, some kind of rocket whizzed past my head, crashing and burning in the forests behind me. Then Glenn and Trapdoor, out of nowhere, popped up on the tank. They seemed exhausted and battle-weary.

"Fuckers have RPGs," said Trapdoor, his voice heavy with desperation.

"And I've got just one grenade to finish them off," added Glenn.

I didn't respond to either of them. I was still absorbing what had just happened to Rick. Eventually both of them took stock and their heads dropped. Then Glenn got back to action. Taking Rick's fallen body from me, he handed me the grenade and pointed to where the RPG man was. While Trapdoor provided covering fire against walkers who stumbled to our area I took the little steel egg and flung it with all of my might towards that bastard. A boom and a body falling from an elevated area signified to us that danger had been handled.

Moving as fast as we could back to the prison, we saw how well things were going in our favor. The walker herd by this point had all but been decimated but that was of little consequence now. All three of the original trucks that had been escorting the tank were still up and running but their fighting spirit had been reduced to all but nil, due to the fact that the were now defending a dead duck of a tank. Between the prison defenders and us, we mopped these remnants up. Someone at the prison had our grenade launcher, and used it to utterly decimate the convoy of trucks, who'd been too low on morale to really do anything in defense. Then, as we headed back towards the gats, Trapdoor went back and mercilessly disposed of the few survivors. Being still in shock from the events of just a few minutes before, I was in no position to really argue with him or talk it out.

The people at the prison began cheering in victory, passing out drinks and preparing for a grand celebration. I, knowing something the rest of them didn't, was in no mood to join the festivities.

I liked it even less when Whiz came out of the forests, bloodied and visibly shaken.

And alone.

**AN: Shorter chapter, but more important one. I debated amongst myself for hours debating whether to kill off Rick or not, but in the end I decided to. It gives Daryl a chance to become leader and also gives him fuel for the plot twists I've got coming in the next chapter.**

**Also, keep reviewing Every time you review, a cookie appears at your kitchen table.**

**-Jokerang**


	15. Dixon Temper

Rick's funeral was the first thing done after breakfast the next day.

Rushing his body to Hershel, any small hope that I or any other may have had about the man's survival was quickly killed. "So many bullets, heart, lungs and many other organs done in," commented Hershel. He, like everyone else, looked like a light had gone out, and that light would take some time to repair.

The honor of putting the bullet in Rick's head to prevent went to Glenn. Carl had already shot one of his parents, he was too emotionally distraught to do the same to another. I was suggested by Hershel, but I couldn't bring myself. Something inside of me just couldn't do it. In the end, Glenn had been the first to volunteer for the job, and he looked away as he put a bullet in the man he had risked himself for one too many times since the two had met. Hell, we'd all saved each others far more times then I could count.

Carl, Tyreese and I set to digging the plot of land in the cemetery where Rick was to be laid to rest. Unsurprisingly, Carl had insisted that he be buried side by side with Lori's grave. In no mood to counter such a decision, we got our shovels and got to work digging up enough dirt to cover the body, which had been cleaned up as best as possible and covered in white sheets. Carl's face would have broken anyone's heart, and it came very close to breaking mine, if it even could. It was so awful to see him weeping, this kid who'd seen people eaten alive, shot his own mother, and had at one point been transformed into another killer, which was Rick's assumption when he'd shot that kid from Woodbury. Once again, he was just a kid again, and had every right to grieve. We all did.

After we'd finished that, I brought everyone from both groups out for some final last words to say before the burial. One by one, they did. Most of them were to the effect of 'thank you' and 'you were such a great leader' kind of things. But three people said things that would be stuck in my mind forever.

The first of these was Glenn. He gave a sort of eulogy. "I didn't meet Rick Grimes because I wanted to. I met him trying to save his life, in Atlanta. he was in the middle of a horde, in a tank. I could have left him there, and not have to risk my life, but I did, because I had this gut feeling that he'd do the same for me any day. And when I was kidnapped by an aggressive gang, it was Rick who'd dealt with them and got my life out. We owe each other, not just for those times but for so many others. I don't know what kind of person I'd become if it wasn't for him and his actions. In this world, actions speak a whole lot more than words, and Rick was a man of action. He was capable of meeting whatever challenges life threw at him. Daryl tells me that he died saving his life, and I'm sure that he's forever in his debt. I'd say thank you, but so has everything else. So I'd like to end with this: if you're watching us, and if there is a heaven, tell Lori and all the others we miss them, and that we miss you too." For the first time in months, he was in tears. Rick and Glenn were very close and his death still haunted him. And me.

Carol was the next to speak. "Thank you. Thank you for that night when you and the others arrived in the nick of time to save me and my little girl. Thank you for getting us to the CDC and giving us hope, and saving us again when that place was scheduled to blow. Thank you for doing your best to look for Sophia, even though it was all in vain. Even though your leadership was one man during that winter, I still want to thank you for it and for every other little thing that was done for our protection in that time. I never got the chance to say so in life..."

As she stopped and brought herself together, Carl took off the sheriff's hat he'd been wearing since the time at Hershel's farm and placed it on top of his father's body, on his chest.

"Take this, dad," he said watery eyed, "You'll need it a lot more than I do. Thanks for letting me have it while you were here."

When he had finished saying this, he fell to his knees with a terrible sob of grief and anguish. Carol and Maggie went to his side to caress his shuddering shoulders. As Glenn and I prepared to carry the body to its final resting place, Beth began to sing a song. It was a beautiful one, but also a sad one that fitted the occasion perfectly. I didn't exactly remember the name of it, but Beth told me it later in the day. It was There You'll Be by Faith Hill or something like that, I'd never really cared about music. As Glenn and I lifted Rick's body into the grave, everyone else dropped their heads let Beth's voice fill the air and their minds. The song not only spoke of Rick, but for all their friends and family we'd lost along the way:

When I think back on these times  
And the dreams we left behind  
I'll be glad 'cause I was blessed to get to have you in my life

When I look back on these days  
I look and see your face  
You were right there for me

In my dreams I'll always see you soar above the sky  
In my heart there'll always be a place for you for all my life  
I'll keep a part of you with me  
And everywhere I am, there you'll be  
And everywhere I am, there you'll be

You know you showed me how it feels  
To feel the sky within my reach  
And I always will remember all the strength you gave to me

Your love made me make it through  
Oh, I owe so much to you  
You were right there for me

In my dreams I'll always see you soar above the sky  
In my heart there'll always be a place for you for all my life  
I'll keep a part of you with me  
And everywhere I am there you'll be

'Cause I always saw in you my light my strength  
And I want to thank you now for all the ways  
You were right there for me, you were right there for me always

In my dreams I'll always see you soar above the sky  
In my heart there'll always be a place for you for all my life  
I'll keep a part of you with me  
And everywhere I am, there you'll be  
And everywhere I am, there you'll be

There you'll be

Throughout all of it, I kept remembering that there was someone else that had also lost their life defending the prison that night. Jay's body was out there, being eaten by walkers all morning, and was he getting the standing ovations, the beautiful song, all the pomp and circumstance, etc? Nope. Not a word of it.

Jay wasn't Rick, of course, and his death wouldn't have nearly as big an impact as Rick's was going to. But he would still be missed. Quite a number of us had gotten to become friends with the man, and he'd impressed everyone with his sniping skills. Hershel all commented that the man's medical knowledge far outweighed his own, and regretted that he couldn't be around to teach him everything that he knew. He would need it.

Whiz told me how it happened. "Got too far from me and too close to the walkers. I told him, I _told _him that he was going to draw the eyes of every walker out there. But he didn't listen. Last I saw of him, he was still shooting, facing a horde of walkers and without much options to go to. Nothing else I could really do." After that, he'd said, he went into some kind of numb mode. he'd linked up with Tyreese and Sasha and proceeded to help them kill off walkers nad such. He looked pretty shellshocked when I first saw him return that night.

He looked fine at lunch afterwards, though. Laughing with some others, drinking beers, talking about how everything last night was no big deal and how the tankw was no sweat. That did it. Something in me went snap. I no longer believed a word coming out of his lying mouth. I knew I had just become the de facto leader, and this wasn't the right time or place, but I couldn't ignore it any longer.

"YOU!" I pushed people left and right as I made a beeline for Whiz. in one fluid movement, I grabbed him and pinned him to one of the walls, using one of my hands to hold his neck in place. There were gasps and shudders all around me.

"Whoa, man," said Whiz. Captain fucking Innocent. "What's going on?"

I put my head so close to his face so that our noses were an inch apart. "I didn't know if it was you at first. Fort Benning. Karen. I could have assumed that it was all a terrible accident, and I gave you the benefit of the doubt. Maybe Karen did just misfire her gun by accident. But then, last night with Jay... I should have known better than to leave someone as valuable as him with you. But I was just relieved that you weren't coming with me. I wanted you off _my _back, because the tank job was too big and too important for you to try and fuck it up somehow."

"Daryl, will you please calm down?"

"CALM DOWN!" I could faintly hear some of the women making cries of horror and fear. I tuned them out.

"This is an emotional time. For all of us. I'm not even sure what you're getting at."

"You!" I was screaming everything pretty much. "You is what I'm getting at!" To make my point, I took a fist and slammed it hard against his face, then pushed him aside, to face me.

"You," I continued, " have been FUCKING with us ever since you got here. You got Karen killed and nearly got the rest of there killed as well. You also got Jay killed. I don't know specifics, but my bet is that you shoved him in the way of those walkers."

"Shoved him? Into walkers? Why the hell would I do that?"

"Because you're the Governor's inside man!" I shouted it out loud like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "You've been sent by him to screw around with us."

"The Governor?" Whiz looked blankly for a second, then gave off one of the biggest laughs I'd ever hear him do. " I've got nothing to do with the Governor. Never have, never will. This is absurd, Daryl. I can't believe I'm hearing any of this, let alone from the hand-picked successor to Rick himself."

"Believe it, you asshole. When you first got here, and we told you everything about our story, you even said you liked what the Governor did with Woodbury."

"So what? Okay, I did, but not after what Rick told me about what he did to his own people. If that's all you've got against me, I've gotta admit, it's pretty flimsy, to say the least."

"Blatant. Rubbing our noses in it."

Whiz laughed again, his way of saying _Are you hearing this unmitigated bullshit? _"You know what, Daryl? You're insane. Going around accusing me of killing my own fellow survivors. Crazy. Growing up with those pathetic excuses for parents, having to kill your inbred brother that way, it's all done something to mess up your mind." He reached with his hand and patted my head. "Inside this sack of shit, it's all clowns and monkeys."

He shouldn't have done that.

"You shouldn't have done that," I said.

"You shouldn't be calling me traitor," he replied back. "And since we're going around accusing each other of things, how about I ask you something? What exactly do you do with Beth in the guardtower at night? I live in a tent outside, you know. Every night I see you two, same pattern, same time."

I froze. As did Carol, Maggie, and Hershel. Even if I got the whole Whiz situation done with, I'd have all three of them on me.

That did it. I swung for Whiz. But he knew me well enough by now. He parted the punch with a forearm block. I tried to punch him with my other arm but he did a knee jab to my gut, sending me back a little. As I got myself together, I felt something hard press against my balls. I looked, and saw that Whiz had a pistol positioned against my crotch.

"You fucker," I hissed.

"I'm just defending my reputation," he said back. "Even if it is the only way I can: by destroying yours and threating to blow off your crown jewels. I deny everything you say about me, and this is me telling you and anyone who believes you to go fuck themselves-"

"Shut the fuck up NOW! You're making Judith cry!"

Carl, who apparently decided to keep Rick's hat, was standing right next to Whiz, his gun trained on the man. The look on his face showed that he disapproved of not only him, but me as well. At the same time, Maggie also came up to me with her own gun, keeping me in place. And Beth was watching the whole thing, in front of the crowd. It was apparent that the Greene sisters were in on Carl's plan.

"Put your gun down away from Daryl, and I'll do the same with mine."

"You wouldn't dare," snarled Whiz.

Whiz cocked his gun, and Carl did the same. the two stared at each other for a few seconds. Eventually Whiz put his gun away, and Carl did the same. "I would never have really done it," he said.

"That makes one of us," said Carl. "Now, the first thing you need to do is back off from Daryl and Beth's relationship. Maybe they had to keep it hidden, but they don't have to anymore. They need each other. Daryl's made Beth a fighter and her love gives him one more reason to stay here and keep you and everyone else in this prison safe. Accept it."

I was relieved. The kid spoke well beyond his years. No doubt the result of everything going on in his life. Whether the folks accepted, though, was another question.

"You're not off the hook so easily either, Daryl," said Carl. "I believe Whiz on this one. He's not acting like someone hiding a secret. I'd do everything he just did if I was falsely accused of a crime I didn't commit."

"But Whiz-"

"Deserves an apology. Give it to him now." said Maggie, cutting me off. I couldn't really argue with her, Carl, or worse, Beth.

"Whiz," I said. "Sorry." I didn't mean it. "Same," he replied, the same lie seething though his face as much as mine.

"I jumped to conclusions." _I still think you got Karen and Jay killed._

"Easily said and done. We're all under stress." _You fucking twat._

He walked away, his eyes never leaving my sight as he left. We both knew that we'd be watching each other for some time. As the crowd slowly dissipated, there was one person I knew I'd failed and pissed off far worse than anyone else: Beth. She was waiting for me at my cell.

**AN: Rick's dead, Daryl just lost his temper for a very stupid reason, and his relationship with Beth is about to be in jeopardy. Oh the drama.**

**As always, review, review, review! It keeps my fingers going and makes me feel the need to make you happy.**

**-Jokerang**


	16. Revelation

The moment I laid eyes on Beth standing there at my cell, I could tell that this was not going to end well. That look on her face showed me that she had enough anger to take on both me and Merle if her was still around. I expected her to say something, but she just didn't. Probably waiting for me to try and explain myself and then she'd pick me apart bit by bit.

"Look," I said, trying to get my argument together. "I can explain all this. Just let me-"

"No." This side of her was reminding me of Maggie a little bit. "You and your damn temper - look at what it's done. You stir up a hornet's nest on the day of Rick's funeral, what would he think of you if he could see all this? I'd say he'd be pretty ashamed in you, Daryl." She was right, though I really didn't want to admit any of it.

"Honestly, I had no idea that Whiz was snooping on us every night! I thought he always went to sleep early, before we went up to that guardtower."

She gave me a really dumb look.

"Daryl, that's not what bothers me. Someone was going to figure out what we were up to every single night. What bothers me is that you acted impulsively, without giving much thought to what you were doing. You antagonized one of our best fighters on a hunch. I've seen you better than this, Daryl. You're a good man when want to be, but if anyone even looks like a threat to you, you just lay onto them and give then whatever you think they deserve until they crack or someone makes you crack instead. That's why I got Carl and Maggie to break up your fight. I couldn't let you go on and be a bad example of a leader on your very first day on the job."

"Are you kiddin' me right now?" I finally found some strength to stand up to her. "Your daddy and sister will be hounding us like stray dogs, what we have could be lost, and you're taking sides with that asshole over me? Beth, I didn't peg you as the stand against me when everything goes to shit type. You can't just ditch me now!"

She turned away, and began to walk off, but then turned around, angry as ever. "You're right. You can't just leave me, which is why I have to. Just stay away from me for now. Hopefully you won't go Merle on us anytime soon."

As she walked off for the final time today, I felt the urge to slap the little bitch out of her mind. But I didn't. I was the leader, and hadn't I done enough things to fuck up the situation around here? Yep, or rather no. The way she compared me to Merle didn't help things either. Both of us were nasty sons of bitches when need be, but I'd grown up thinking that he was the one who was always angry, the one who ended up being the wild card, the loose cannon who couldn't be controlled. Now, looking at how everyone viewed me as the one who would lash out at anyone against them.

_You people look at me like I'm the devil._ Merle's words were once again applying to his brother. I was almost ashamed.

All those months of trying to gain the favor of the group, from searching for Sophia to being their main walker hunter and doing just about everything for them, and this was what it was coming to? I had once had forsaken loving any woman, knowing from experience that the other sex could only bring me down. And they did.

But Beth was getting to me. In all my years I'd never felt for her what I felt for any other woman. She made me feel wanted, loved, and alive.

I could deny it all wanted, but I was falling in love with Beth Greene. What had started as a sexual fling was growing into something far more serious and passionate.

I needed to find Hershel. Maybe he could sort out my relationship issues, as well as be the new leader. God knows I couldn't be. Not anymore.

* * *

I found Hershel in his cell, tending to his leg. The broken one. even after adjusting to it, he still had this odd habit of rubbing it and feeling what wasn't there. Phantom limbs, or whatever it was called.

"Hey old man," I said to him. "Think you have a few minutes to spare?"

Hershel looked at me with a somewhat worried face. "I'm expecting this to be about you and Beth, isn't it?"

I braced myself. "Yea, I suppose it is... No, that's not it. I'm giving you my leadership position. You're far better suited to it than I am, you saw as well as anyone else what kind of monster I was out there, laying a strip off him like that."

Hershel took a deep breath. "I still think you can move past that and be a better person. But first let's talk about Beth-"

"Yea, yea, I'll stay away from her if that's what you want from me." It was a lie. I didn't want to be anywhere far away from her.

Hershel gave a little laugh, sighed again, and began. "When your affair with Beth got exposed to me, I knew I was going to have to make a very serious decision, not just for the sake of you two, but for everyone else as well. My first thoughts were to come up to you and slap the hell out of your face. But then, what Carl said... I hope you can raise that young man in the right direction. He's very intelligent, but only when he wants to be. Anyways, what he said about you two needing each other, struck a chord with me. Every word of that sentence was true. If you care about her, then that is a reason to stay here and defend the weak instead of running off on your own as you've attempted in the past. And I'm sure that you've grown fond of her. Every person that she's around does. It's a part of who she is, my friend."

"So... are you mad at me?" I needed the answer to this question.

"Not as mad as I once was. Under any other circumstances, you would have not been my first choice for my little girl. People like you and Merle, in the world before, would have never been around my girls. However times change. We don't really have the luxury of the first choice of partner anymore. But we make do with what the world left us. Daryl, you, more than anyone here in this building, were more adopted to this life more than anyone else. You're strong willed and have a softness that I only see around certain individuals like Judith. I can now see why Beth would be drawn to. You're the best suitor in this world she could have right now."

"Hershel," I started. "Now that I think about it, I'm no good for her. I'm just some crazy redneck with a crossbow, going around and-"

"You think Asian boys were Maggie's first pick in men?" That brought a laugh in both of us, and he was right. It really took a zombie apocalypse to make an Asian man and a white girl to fall in love with each other. I hadn't seen a couple of those races until the farm.

"And such," continued Hershel, "I think Beth chose you for a reason. You might not understand right now, but you will eventually. Glenn and Maggie didn't become instant lovers, and neither did me or either of my wives. You won't either, but if you feel the same way I do, then you will wait and see what her heart is telling her. I can't control what she wants or desires, only she can do that."

"Very well," I told the old man. "She's super pissed at me though. More because of the fact that I'm no good at a leader than the fact we had to keep things hidden from everyone."

"I'll talk to her. I've seen this situation one too many times where Beth cuts off those she cares about in her silent rage at something. I'm used to it. And you _are _the leader. It's what Rick would have wanted, and it's what I want. Can't go making decisions for everyone on one leg, can I?"

"But-"

"But you are needed more than ever. I firmly believe that. So do Glenn and Maggie. As mad as they are at you for your outburst, both of them are behind me in feeling that this group and it's survival are in your hands, Daryl. And I think Beth would agree. She may not show it now, but give her some time, and she eventually will come to you again. Whether you two need each other or not is not up to me, it's up to the two of you."

"Fine by me, even though I'm still doubting half of it. Now, I need you and the rest of the leaders to meet me in outside in the catwalk in one hour. We've got a a lot of things that need discussing."

He nodded, his face telling me that there was hope, even if was a small chance.

* * *

The meeting was a serious one. In light of the tank threat, and the assumption that Major Hanson was on the verge of war with us, we had to assess everything and prepare for bad, and the worst.

Maggie, Glenn, Hershel, Trapdoor, Tyreese and myself were up there and going over Rick's plans he had left behind for emergency evacuation. Four or so people to a car, with the Woodbury folks taking the bus we'd used to take them here. At Herschel's insistence, I was in the car along with Glenn, Maggie, and most importantly Beth and Judith. We were both the core of the group and one of the most vulnerable.

Then we had to go over our weapons inventory. The list went something like this:

-50 assault rifles and submachine guns

-80 pistols, sidearms, and other handguns

-20 sniper rifles

-a grenade launcher with 15 grenades

-enough ammo, we hoped, to last a full scale assault

We'd lost our head man and one of our vehicles yesterday. Tyreese and Sasha had been forced to ditch it in order to not get in the line of fire of those trucks. Sasha was out of action for the foreseeable future, the result of a concussion that had left her in a coma. Hershel was doing all he could for her, but she wasn't looking too good. All the Woodbury people that were able bodied enough to hold a gun had volunteered to fight and defend if need be, but how good they were would be put to the test soon enough. The fences torn down by the Governor's men had been replaced with crude barricades for two gunmen to hide behind and use for cover. We'd also done our best to clear the rubble from the wrecked guardtowers to make ourselves some nice little sniper nests, a gift for whatever motherfuckers decided to screw around with our prison.

The respite lasted a little under three hours. We did our best to make the time both valuable and enjoyable. One person was on guard while a majority of us held a poker tournament. It sucked. I was never any good at Texas Hold'em. Beth was, though, and was filled with glee this one time it was the two of us contending for the pot after the five cards had been laid down. She ended up winning, and I just groaned, but Hershel's nods he gave me indicated that he had been talking with her, and maybe she could come to terms with everything.

Then they arrived.

* * *

Under a white flag of truce, a delegation of them arrived at one of the surviving gates. Three of them in all. Major Hanson, of course, and two of his bodyguards, dressed in gas masks and flak jackets. We ignored them at first, but the loudspeaker they had with them soon became too much for our ears to bear. They initially requested an audience with Rick, but only smirked and snickered when they found out he wasn't around anymore.

In the event, They got to talk to me. As their guns were trained on me, I brought a group of my own, taking Glenn, Tyreese and Trapdoor to provide cover and moral support. What a standoff.

"Daryl Dixon," Hanson gave a false smile, pearly white teeth showing. "Well, well, well. What a state your prison is in. An impressive facility once, though it would never be the rival of Fort Benning."

"Let's cut the chitchat, sunshine," I told him. "What's deal here? You know that tank could only be yours. Are you here to take up our offer of peace and friendship? Because we could really use the reinforcements right now. The Governor's had us on the ropes a couple of times, and your help could end all that. We'll even forgive the whole tank incident. Us together, the dream team, what do you say?" The question had already been decided, but what the hell, I could try anyways.

And I failed. Hanson's contemptuous laugh was an answer in itself.

"Oh hell no. Never. In light of your treachery in our home base, an alliance? I think not."

"It was an accident," I said rather unconvincingly, mostly because I wasn't convinced it was an accident. "It was a slip-up, and I wished it never happened."

"So it may be, but it doesn't change the past. Many of my men died that day, including Lieutenant Vatz, who was very respected by the men he knew. And after I gave specific orders to my men not to harm any of you. I took that as personal affront. A deliberate slap in the face. Any charitable feelings I once had for your group are now gone. Now I only wish your death."

"Well, in that case, why am I still standing here? I'm guessing you're just here to tell me the deal's off, right?"

"I suppose. This is just me saying in a courteous manner that our two group are officially at war with each other. A new age is looming, and the Governor and I have agreed to assist each other in having Fort Benning rise up from the ashes of the ruinous world and rebuild it in our fashion. Starting with the destruction of this prison and its inhabitants."

"So that's it. You're siding with the Governor. No ifs, ands, or buts."

"Correct."

"And if at a later date he turns on you?"

"We will act accordingly," said Hanson with a look that revealed that he was confident in his speech. "But I doubt that will ever come to pass, especially if we prove helpful in our war with you."

"Right now I'm looking at three Army soldiers. Forgive me if we're not exactly quaking in our shoes."

"Ah, but observe."

At that point one of the bodyguards took out a radio and said into it "Alright, bring the first one out now."

Then it arrived. A big eighteen wheeler came into view, and then it pulled over. About half a dozen soldiers surrounded it. it had 'walkers and biters' painted on its side, indicating its purpose. Behind it were at least a dozen military vehicles. Humvees, Jeeps, you name it.

"We have the prison fully surrounded," said Hanson, " and there is plenty more where this comes from. We will give you one hour to prepare what mediocre defense you can muster up for us. One hour and not a second more, Then, we lay siege. We will continue to attack until every last one of you is dead or has surrendered. Goodbye, Daryl Dixon. When we see each other again- and I'm sure we will - you will find me far less friendly." Hanson smiled, turned and left with his companions, his troops also disappearing into the forest.

**AN: What do you guys think of this chapter? Leave your comments in review form.**

**-Jokerang**


	17. War

Hanson was as good as his word. One hour after the meeting at the gate, the first eighteen wheeler filled with walkers came crashing at our doorstep.

I'd used the grace period to go over with Glenn all the possible weak points our enemies could attack and how to position ourselves to best defend the prison. We had weak spots and we had plenty of them. A couple of guardtowers wrecked and several destroyed fences. The largest of them was big enough to fit an eighteen wheeler in pretty well, so we guessed that there was the place for the first assault. We needed our best people defending that area, so we arranged a little barricade for four shooters to position themselves right in front of the hole. While the Woodbury folks kept watch around the rest of the perimeter, the main group was waiting for those walkers to come on out of that hole and attempt a beachhead from the courtyard.

That was exactly the plan the walker handlers had in mind. As a team of two soldiers - one to provide covering fire, the other to open the trailer doors, - came around, we hit them with strafing fire from numerous directions, We took them both down, but not before they managed to get those walkers out and running. To conserve our ammo, we kept the firing distance to about fifty meters or less. The riot gear those walkers had on deflected some of our bullets, but only from longer distances. A few of them got over the barricades and the fighting got hand-to-hand and dirty. The majority, however, didn't make it past the courtyard. The bodies began to pile up in the breaches, two or even three walkers high. This first attack lasted about twenty five minutes before the driver of the eighteen wheeler realized he was fucked five ways to Sunday if he didn't get the hell out of our prison, and he did his best.

By this point I had an idea. "Get those bodies around the holes in the near the holes in the fences. This will be perfect. Brilliant."

"Go on then," said Glenn, and then, as we got the bodies positioned ASAP, I outlined briefly what the idea was. "That just might work. Maybe."

"Oh please, Short Round. You just wish it was your idea."

"Whatever."

"Fire!" I yelled as the next walker groups were being brought in by vans and trailers. All across the prison, people poured gasoline onto the walker corpses, which had been stripped of any gear we could use. We then got out our matches, lighters, even makeshift torches and bombs. Catching fires, the walker bodies soon became a big flaming barrier, and it did one of two things to the new walkers coming at us by the dozens: they either were driven back by the heat, or, more commonly, they headed straight for us nevertheless, even though the fire did not leave them unharmed. Many of them made it past the flames, but those that did were disfigured, mutilated, scarred, even less human creatures that were too easy to take out. Now, with their creatures compromised and themselves more vulnerable than before, the walker handlers began fleeing for the safety of the forests. Unfortunately for them, our best snipers were out there, taking them down as they ran. Hershel was up there, on a special platform for his leg, leading the shooting, his rifle cracking repeatedly. No walker or soldier he aimed at made it back alive. He would ratchet the rifle bolt, sight, pull the trigger, and that was another potential problem flat on the deck. Reloading the clip took him close to no time was well.

The stench from the mess we'd made was noting far from atrocious. All that burning flesh, blood and bone. As the flames subsided and the smoke cleared, another attack began, this time on the other side of the prison, Maybe thirty to thirty-five soldiers, all geared up and ready for a full-scale war, began marching and making their way towards our western flank. I could tell they weren't going to make their way towards the breaches. Not after they did that twice and failed both times.

Boy, they were tough. Those bastards came at us like the biggest, ugliest mounds of sand and dirt and kept on going. These weren't your regular ROTC recruits, these all had to have been special forces at one point or another. They had gas masks, they had riot gear and flak jackets, they had fully automatic assault rifles and light machine guns. We all tried our damn best to take them out and gun them down, but these were far better protected than anything the walkers were equipped with. While a few got hit or hid behind something for cover, The majority of them pushed on past the field of grass and were within attacking distance of the main prison buildings. They did their best to raise hell, but it didn't.

Instead, they were in for some immediate hospitality. From all our arranged hiding places and crannies, out came the Woodbury volunteers, a good dozen of them in all at this side of the prison, out and ready to defend their new home. Armed with Winchesters, Magnums, and a handful of grenades, they show those invaders the same lesson that the Americans had learned in Vietnam and the Russians in Afghanistan: that numbers and technology will not always prevail over an adversary defending their home. Never underestimate the sheer force of will and the determination to win. From my field of vison, about a dozen or more of the soldiers were taken down in about five minutes at point blank range, leg wounds mostly, because the defenders were smart enough to avoid the upper areas due to all that body armor.

Our lot, the original group, held their end of the line just as well. From their sniper nests, Glenn, Maggie, and Hershel all sent soldiers and walkers falling and tumbling, dispatching them from all sides. Closer up, Tyreese and Michonne melee fought most of the remaining walkers off with their signature hammer and katana, while another group covered them. Beth was among them. Noah and Carl too. I didn't expect these two kids to be pumped up and eager for a fight. I had anticipated that they would need a day or two to recover and get back in the mood. None of that for these two. Their parents had died fighting those sons of bitches, and they wanted their revenge sooner than later. Any walker or soldier that got in the crosshairs of either of those two demons didn't live nearly long enough to regret it.

I, for the most part, did my own thing, and did a pretty good job of it as well. Just let the inner hunter and berserker inside me out and have some fun every once in a while. Circling the prison God knows how many times, I forgot everything. I didn't feel anger or fear or regret or hatred. I didn't have any petty problems any more. Nothing bothered me or distracted me. I was pure purpose. I currently had one thing to do and that was to kill walkers and soldiers. They appeared and I killed them in any which way. Some I shot, some I stabbed, some I bolted. I had my crossbow in one hand, a Glock in the other as I plowed through them, cold, unfeeling, inhospitable. I felt I could have gone on forever. Time had no meaning to me. I measured my progress in terms of enemies exterminated. The only tally I cared for was the one of racking up dead walkers.

This was what I did best, at the core. Nature hadn't designed me to have a McJob or become cozy Mr. Domestic. Hadn't been that way before the end and I wasn't going to be that way anytime soon. I was designed to fight, kill, and slay. This - mowing down the enemy and thinning them out - was me.

And the blackness inside of me, the dark side, was being exulted. It screamed with joy beyond happiness. It didn't get a high like this from anything else, really. Drink, drugs, sex, they all more or less paled by comparison. Substitutes. _This_ was the real deal. The utter, unutterable bliss of not having to think, not having to feel, only having to recognize, react, and move on. See enemy, kill enemy, and repeat. Perhaps for infinity, or until the supply of enemies ran out. Soon the sun began to set. Apparently Hanson had decided that it was enough for one day, and that he could just besiege us forever. The remaining soldiers ran off, and the last walkers were killed and used as a way of releasing all the anger and pain still inside of us.

We watched them go, scavenging the dead, for all that we could use, knowing we hadn't won, knowing they'd be back soon, but knowing that we'd done well and had given or best in the field of fighting. After all, we still had the prison, hadn't we? And if we had that, we still had something that the Governor wanted but still didn't have. If he wanted it, he could die trying.


	18. Sex, Desperation, and Hope

I was keeping a night lookout on the intact guardtower, making sure our adversaries didn't try anything during the night. So far, it looked like everyone might just get a good nights sleep. Those soldiers weren't invincible, and Hanson knew as well as anyone that sleep was needed by his troops if they were to be ready for the next day. There were a lot of campfires in every direction, and from the looks of it plenty of nighttime sentries as well. The stars were out there in the millions, each of them a speck of ice. The moon was also out there, as round and as hard as a cannonball.

Someone came up the stairs to the top. It was Beth. She had a cup of tea in each hand. I took one and drank a sip.

"I thought I'd keep you company," she said.

We stared at each other in silence for a few seconds. I assumed that she'd gotten over our argument from the morning, but there was no way of telling. Women were always like that. Sometimes they showed their emotions exactly how they wanted to out in the open, other times they just disguised them, revealing them only at the worst possible moments for people like me. Never a good way to tell.

"You still mad at me or something?" I asked her. She didn't reply, instead getting another sip of her drink. I decided to do likewise and get a drink of my own. Aw, I hadn't drunken something as fresh as that in a month.

"You know, I'm sorry. For everything really." I kept going at it. Seemed to be one thing that worked from time to time.

"I know," she replied in her soft voice. It was barely any more than a whisper. "Daddy still has faith in you. Despite everything, he still thinks you're the main reason we're still standing. So do Glenn and Maggie. They're under as much stress as you are. They actually had a fight just before those soldiers came at our front door."

I sat down with her and put an arm around her shoulders. "Soldiers that'll have to get through me and die before touching you. Now what did Short Round and her sister whine to each other about."

She shrugged. "I was walking past them so I didn't really get what it was all about. Something about God not coming to rescue us and how no one was in real authority anymore, not even you, and how it was just going to be a slaughter and the Governor would just keep coming until we were all dead. That was Maggie. She looked like something died inside of her. Glenn was doing his best to comfort her when you came back and told everyone that we were going to war."

"War," I said to myself. "I guess you could call it that. Good guys like us fighting for the right reasons, evildoers like the Governor with obviously evil intentions. Yep, it's almost a fantasy sometimes."

"Perhaps. Maggie's better, by the way. I guess all that shooting allowed her to let off all her steam. There was another fight going on when I came up here to give you your drink."

"Who was it between?" By this point Beth was practically sitting on my lap. I did my best to position her well and give her support with my manly legs.

"Trapdoor and one of the Woodbury men. The Woodbury man called Trapdoor a name and he walked out fuming. That was all I saw."

"Well, they're both big boys. The can sort themselves out. It's another pressure situation. There's bound to be more friction coming. I'll have myself a chat with them later, but my guess is that they probably just getting on each others nerves. Nothing to worry about."

Beth leaned back, using my body as a sort of pillow. She looked into my eyes, and I looked back. So beautiful. Then she stared at one of the fires started by the soldiers and said, "Quiet out there."

"Agreed. They're probably re-equipping themselves and reloading for the net fight. Remember, they have many more vehicles that they didn't send against us on their first three go-rounds so we can probably expect those in a day or two."

She sat there in my lap for a few minutes. I was about to assume that she was falling asleep and dozing off in my embrace, and was trying to make sure that she was as comfortable as possible. Then, out of the blue, she turned around, grabbed my face, and passionately kissed me. I was pretty surprised at first, but soon made myself accustomed to it and returned the favor even better than she had done. After that I'd taken the liberty to remove her of her shirt, and my own shirt as well. Finished with that, she had this very malicious looking smile on her face, and I could tell that my own face was plastered with the same smile.

"Despite everything, I still think you've done wrong," she said, grinning, "and I feel that you haven't been fully... _punished,_ to say the least."

"Punishment?" I asked her as I was grabbing her breasts again and rubbing them as best I could. "Well, if this is what going to Hell feels like, I'm thing I'm going to enjoy it. Mine," I said as my head dived forward and took itself a nipple. Beth moaned again as she began to undo the ponytail she had her hair in, letting the golden locks flutter like bright flames. Flames that were mine for my other hand to freely let itself stroke and adore.

"Wait a minute," I said out loud, all at the same time spreading my hands around this maddening girl who less than twenty four hours ago was on the verge of pissing me off for good, "did you come here for some kind of sympathy fuck or make-up sex? If so..."

She raised an eyebrow.

"Well, I really don't care. I'm sure it'll be fun no matter what your reasons are."

"Right attitude. And yes, I could say that this is us healing the damages we've delivered to each other over the day. And of course, our desires."

"Ah. Back to the good stuff," I said as I lifted her legs from under her and flipped her on her back, onto a table. I quickly remove those pants and boots so that I get myself a nice, good taste of that pussy. Licking it fast and constantly, I hear a bunch of giggles from Beth, her arms stretching out and about. She's clearly enjoying it. After that, I take her delicate hand and let her own fingers get themselves wet. Then I lead them up to her lips. "Here. Taste yourself," I tell her as she does as I say, absorbing in the moment, enjoying every little thing. Then she's the one to notice my boner, which had been slowly growing for the last two minutes but hadn't come out fully until now. "Touch yourself," Beth was ordering me. "It's okay, it's so sexy." I really had no choice but to comply with that angelic command. I did a little saber rattling until I was dripping. As for Beth, she was licking her lips like some beast eyeing its prey, sizing it up for the hunt.

Now she was completely naked. It was a sight my eyes never got bored of seeing. On the contrary, they wanted to see it every time she came around me. Legs opening again, I took it to myself to position her before pounding my way in as I always did. She put her hands nearby, gripping the table edge, knowing the pure orgasm she's about to receive. As I, well, inserted my way in, she clutches both the table and my arm harder than ever, struggling to contain herself and all the ecstasy she's clearly going through. Her blue eyes are surging with passion and her body shakes at the sheer weight of what's about to happen. Then, she comes, and I'm left panting, needing air from all the joy I was receiving myself.

"Wanna go again?" She really knows the art of seduction by now.

"Hell yes," I say as I pick her up and put her on the floor. This time, we're going doggy, but in my fashion. I get on top of her, hands clutching breasts as I put myself in her again. This time she just moans, still recovering from the first encounter and regaining her strength for the next. Her hips began to get shaky, and I stabilize them before going again.

However, it's almost midnight, and Beth begins to fall asleep in my care. Remembering what Hershel and I spoke about earlier, I whispered "I love you," and tenderly kissed her forehead. She muttered something I couldn't understand, then resumed to her beauty sleep. Soon I was also drifting off to sleep without realizing it.

It was a lovely night outside.

The best.

* * *

Screams broke the morning calm.

I was awake in a moment's notice. So was Beth; she was already u and looking out the nearest window, listening to the commotion outside.

"What is it?" I asked.

"I think they captured someone."

"What? No fucking way!"

"Look."

I took a good hard look. Someone - it looked like an older man - was running from a couple of walkers, but each way he went another walker came out of nowhere to conveniently trap him. Then I realized that these walkers weren't unrestrained. Each of them had some kind of rope around its neck, and each of those ropes led to being held by different men, who were clearly Governor thugs rather than the neat and orderly Army troopers. Whatever they had planned was not going to be pretty.

One of the men wasn't holding a rope attaching a walker but rather a loudspeaker. Martinez.

"He came to us in the middle of the night" said Martinez loud and clear, knowing that he had an audience. "He said that he was tired of fighting, and that with Rick dead, there was no more need for unnecessary murder and killings. The odds against them were hopeless." Martinez pointed to the terrified man, just inches from the walker's hungry mouths and fingers. "This is the Governor's response. He says that he does not allow is enemies to go unpunished."

He gestured to the other men, who quickly cut the ropes attaching the walkers and ran as fast as they could back into the safety of the trees. The walkers, seeing the easy treat, all lunged for the hapless man, who screamed as loud as he could as he was slowly torn apart by teeth and nails.

"Motherfucker!" I cursed as Beth gasped in horror. Thinking to myself, I headed out of the guardtower and reached for the nearest sniper rifle. I aimed at the walkers. Michonne, the first person to reach me, shook her head in disbelief.

"I don't think there's anything you can do for him," she said.

"Oh yes there is. The Governor may not know what mercy is, but at least I can say I do," I told her as I fired off five shots at walker heads. Once again, the field was silent.

* * *

It wasn't until the noon that I learned that the man had been the same one that Trapdoor had been arguing with last night. His name was Bruce or something. Trapdoor told me over a few beers. I was still in disbelief at what Trapdoor said.

"Fuck. Fuck the fucking fucker," I said to him.

"I know. I can't believe it either. I never suspected that he'd... y'know, run off on us like that. Suppose we should all be grateful he only went alone, and only took his own guns."

"Is that the general mood?" I asked. "Could've been more?"

"Afraid so. There's a lot of unhappy folks here, Daryl. Not just the Woodbury people, some of your lot as well. They're wondering if it's worth it anymore. We're already down by Rick, our best leader, and no disrespect to you, Glenn, or Hershel, but none of y'all really fill the gap that he left behind. He was the only one the Woodbury people trusted. And there's God knows how many walkers not to mention the Governor and those soldiers bum boys. Fuck knows what's gonna happen. There are men and women here who reckon that Bruce had the right idea."

"Yeah, and look how far that dumb son of a bitch got."

"That only makes it worse. They feel like rats in a cage, with no way out."

"Hold on, how come this is all news to me? I would've picked this up by now."

"No offense, Daryl but you gotta remember you're the de facto leader of this ragged bunch. You give orders, you hang out with the inner group, so, to quote a military term, you're officer class. Naturally no one's gonna tell anything straight to your face."

"Except you."

"Except me. And then there's that incident last morning, the way you laid into Whiz at Rick's funeral..."

"Officer class again?"

"Well, you were that and, a little..."

"Go ahead. I've heard worse."

"Nutty. Nutty as squirrel shit, bro."

I took a look around the area. People were hunched over with their food. No one else looked like they got as much sleep as I did. Hollow eyes and gaunt faces everywhere. It was time to take matters in hand. I stood up.

"What are you doing, bro?" asked Trapdoor.

"Taking the lead," I said as I used a spoon to hit my table until everyone in the prison had their eyes on me.

"Alright folks," I announced, "gonna keep this as short and sweet as possible. Last night one of you did a very foolish thing out there, and died because of it. If I had any suspicion of what he was planning, I would have done my best to talk some sense to him. If that failed, I would have knocked the sense straight into him. I know you guys are thinking we're screwed, that there's no point carrying on, that if the walkers don't get us, the Governor and his henchmen will. Not only is that way of thinking complete bullshit, you've allowed yourselves to believe it. Yes, we've had setbacks, yes the enemy does seem to have the upper hand. But let me tell you something. If the red team has something that the blue team doesn't have, the red team still wins, hands down. It ain't gonna matter how many of them there are out there, how well equipped or not, we will always have something worth defending, and we will win."

"What's worth defending?" asked one of the Woodbury men. "A fucked up old prison?"

There was a ripple of bleak laughter.

"You're lives," I responded. "Your families, for those of you who still have them. Your friends and companions. The Governor is going to come here and kill every last one of them until they're all dead. That is why we are defending this 'fucked up old prison'. So cut all the crap, get your weapons ready, and be prepared to wipe off that smile on the Governor's face. Let's roll, people!"

There was no grand applause, but then again I wasn't Lincoln and I wasn't reciting the Gettysburg address, and at least I'd knocked the despair out of some of them. And given them hope in the process.

_Because, _I thought to myself, _when you're at the gates of Hell, and all the demons and monsters are closing in on you, when everything's stacked against you and your last bits of strength are fleeing - hope's the only real weapon you've got._


	19. Full Throttle

We had one day of rest, before the enemy launched a surprise attack early next morning.

They started the next round of assaults by dumping the walkers in packs to assault us, opting to go for the breaches again, charging with everything they had, using some crude weapons like sticks even. They threw themselves over the gaps, and they often tripped one anther in their urge to eat our flesh and blood. We tried using grenades to hold them back, but they just kept on moving, some with half an arm or leg, others with blood seeping out a dozen wounds, all undeterred. Even with both legs down they still crawled and came towards us.

A girl named Taryn copped it right in front of me. She was in the process of reloading her pistol when a walker got her. I didn't have a clear shot or I would've taken him out then and there. His left arm was gone. Whole chunks of him were missing. I didn't know how it still could be alive. Yet walkers could survive anything. The thing grabbed her with the other arm it had left, and pulled with all its strength. The girl kicked, screamed, and struggled all she could, but to no avail. The walker took another good lunge and with one movement reached her face and bit it straight off with everything gone. My response was to fire an entire half-magazine of Glock ammo into that fucker's head. It might not bring the girl back, but it would make me feel a whole lot better.

While I didn't notice the rain as I preformed this little act of revenge, I eventually did. The rain was soft and not very blinding, but little by little it would consume all of us. It fell on our hair and clothes, and dampened. It got on our guns and melee weapons, and settled. It dropped on the helmets of the enemy soldiers and my poncho alike. I remember in movies that rain almost always signified that something bad was going to happen. It here, it was the same. The only people on either side who didn't seem to mind the rain were the walkers. In fact, they seemed to thrive in it, since they were undead and didn't care about things like the worries of guns jamming or ruined clothes. Slowly we were forced to give up ground piece by piece, although we forced them to pay a heavy toll for each inch they defiled.

Noah was the next causality in my vicinity. One of the Governor's men snuck up on him and with one fell sloop of his machete, struck the kid clean across the shoulder. The boy fell to one knee, groaning from the wound he'd just received from the bastard. However, the man didn't seem satisfied by the attack ending then and there. He struck again, this time catching Noah in the left leg as he was trying to get back up. A burst of both pain and blood erupted from Noah, as the kid screamed in pure pain and agony. Once again, he was no longer a fighter avenging a lost parent, but a scared boy in a cruel world. The Governor man then applied the finishing touch with another slash to the face, and Noah went still. I had just emptied the magazine in my Glock, but it didn't matter. I swung at that son of a bitch with my knife. A bullet would have been too clean and too merciful. I needed to punished him, and make him _feel_ the pain he'd just inflicted in the process.

Our weapons whirled, but I wouldn't stay still, I tried to get every little nick and cut that I could get in him. Finally I got what I was looking for. I brought the knife down to the kneecap and stuck it in hard. In a heartbeat, the man dropped his machete and grabbed at the knife, trying to get it out. I only let go of it to pick up the fallen weapon. While he wasted his last seconds pulling a now useless blade, I grabbed a fresh new one and cut off his right arm as fast as I could. The man howled in pain again, blood gushing from the stump that had once been his right arm and also that knee stab. The next move I made, a nice and solid beheading, was almosta mercy killing. Such a shame.

Then a trio of bullets whizzed past me. I looked up to see who fired them. Only one person possessed such a face and an eye patch like that.

It was the Governor.

"Well, well, Dixon," he remarked as he walked calmly and smoothly past the bodies all around us. "I see you're prepared to die today. I wonder how well you'll do compared to Merle. What a wuss he was."

"You've fucked with my family for the last time," I growled as I charged at him with my machete fully swinging.

The Governor quickly pulled out his own Bowie knife and countered my parry. The fight got very dirty very quickly. Both of us fought like animals, with no rules or civility anywhere. The objective was to kill the other man and to make him suffer in the process. The Governor attempted another stab with his knife, and the only thing stopping it was my hand grabbing the blade, difficult as it was. I could see blood seeping out of the hand, but I pushed the pain aside as I used the other hand to deliver a crushing blow to that fucker's face. He fell back with a bloody nose. I press on the advantage, kicking and punching him in every way I possibly could. Then, out of practically no where, a pair of legs pushed themselves onto my stomach and sent it upwards and away from the Governor's smirking gob. He then pulled out a metal axe, similar to the one I'd encountered at Fort Benning. I kicked at him while I lay flat on the ground, but it was to no avail. The Governor looked like that he was finally going to bury the hatchet with the Dixon brothers once and for all -and from the looks of it, not in the way that would prove particularly pleasing to me. I thought that this was it. This is how I die - at the mercy of a sadistic maniac, the same one that offed Merle.

Then, for about the hundredth time in my life, an unknown salvation came to me. A bullet hit the Governor in the arm, and he backed off to call for a medic nad several me to cover his escape. At the same time, a pair of arms came on each of my arms and grabbed me away from him. I looked up to see my saviors. They were Carl and Trapdoor. Both visibly worried about the situation.

"Daryl," shouted Carl, "we got to get back in the prison. There are walkers everywhere!"

A quick glance around confirmed the terrible truth. Most of the courtyard was filled walkers, feasting on the Woodbury defenders that were in charge of defending this area. The three of us would soon be in that category if we didn't run ASAP, and we did, killing a walker here or there to clear our path.

"You WILL die," roared the Governor's voice. "You will suffer far worse that Michonne, you hear me?"

"Yeah, and for the second date?" I asked.

Our little ragtag exodus quickly slammed the door of the nearest guardtower, using some broken metal bars to barricade the door. It wasn't the sturdiest thing in the world, but it held fast against the walkers slamming against it, and that was all that mattered. We would survive. For now.

I headed out the back door to regroup with others. Our situation was getting bleaker and bleaker by the minute. And just when things couldn't get any worse. They did.

* * *

The rain and sounds of battle prevented any of us from hearing their engines, but as the got closer and closer, we could more easily make them out. A trio of helicopters, and big ones too, slowly approached our prison, the sounds of the rotors constantly filling my eardrums. Each of them had an impressive chain gun at the nose, swing around skillfully and nefariously. Water from the clouds swished off of the rotors and onto the wet and soggy forest. Everyone around me stopped to stare at them. You just couldn't ignore them. I headed up to the nearest guardtower from cell block C, Beth and Carl accompanying me to take a look the latest in our list of horrors thrown against us.

The first of the helicopters was coming to rest just outside one of the main gates, not far from where the emptied and gutted hulk of that tank was still standing. It took its position like some white trash beauty queen taking it's throne without a care for the world or anything in it. The fans on its top slowly ceased their churning. Then from numerous doors on both side, there they came. More soldiers, but no the regular kind. Engineers, it looked like. These boys were all carrying some kind of explosives. From RPGs to grenade launchers on their rifles and other kinds of rocket launchers that looked as menacing as the tank barrel. In fact, these looked harder to take down than the tank, because they were much closer to us than the tank ever did get to our prison. The other two helicopters did likewise, dumping off more of that damned cargo. Oh happy days.

They sprinted towards our prison, a good forty of them or so, boots trampling the mud as those choppers flew off to do whatever they were planning to do next.

I looked at Carl and Beth. "You know how I said that the Governor wouldn't win?"

They both nodded.

"Well, I might have been mistaken."

Luckily, both of them thought I was joking. I totally wasn't.

* * *

Quickly as they could, Maggie, Glenn and I got up in various ruined guardtowers and took up sniping positions. Meanwhile, Tyreese and Michonne got out to the field infested with walkers and began sending them down, going as fast as they could. The soldiers on the east side, however, began to double their efforts. We were already being shitted on pretty bad already. Now with this batch of engineers coming at us as fast as they well could, they were shitting on us harder than ever. They knew we were in desperate straits, and prepared to do their best to take advantage of it.

Glenn, Maggie and I all did our best sending those bastards down. Engineers or not, they met their match in the form of three righteously pissed off folks with the best sniper rifles we could find. They came in firing in full throttle at the prison walls, knocking some down, and then we proceeded to send them off their feet. One of them had just finished firing off an RPG warhead to get a bullet clean in the face, causing the RPG he had been preparing to go off and hit two of his buddies, who were no better off as they exploded in puddles of organs and red blood. Some walkers, seeing these guys as the bigger threat, also suprisingly aided us, tearing apart some of those bastards s they ran into them. I could see the rest scrambling, running around like mad. I could imagine them shouting to each other as to why these mother fuckers weren't _breaking_ like they should, and how three ordinary civilians and a dozen runaway zombies were getting the better of the might of the remnants of the US military somehow. On paper this should have been a rout. So why were they the ones receiving all of the punishment, rather than dealing it out?

For a brief moment, I allowed myself to believe that we could win again. Between the sniping ranges of me, Glenn and Maggie and the walkers, the engineers had their hands full. They were taking causalities by the truckload, and couldn't retaliate fast enough. The rain was going away and Tyreese and Michonne had almost finished clearing out that courtyard for the last time, both of which were in our favor. Just maybe...

And then one of those choppers came around for a shooting run. That was the last straw. The final action that decided the battle.

**AN: I have posted three chapters without reviews. My muses are getting disappointed.**

**As usual, R&R! Responses from you guys is what keeps me going.**

**-Jokerang**


	20. Suffer

_And then one of those choppers came around for a shooting run. That was the last straw. The final action that decided the battle._

The chopper's run began with the courtyard where Tyreese and Michonne were just about finished clearing out the walkers in. The chain guns accuracy wasn't anything near perfect, but it didn't need to be. The walkers themselves were the first to take the brunt of it. Laser dots speckled them, like a case of measles, and then pieces of them began going here and there. They jerked and flailed under a rain of hundreds of bullets. Tyreese was our first human casualty from the gun run. He was hiding under a pile of rubble created by an RPG round, but several well aimed missiles would ensure that he was dead for good. Michonne was left alive, most likely on purpose for whatever the Governor had planning for her, and a couple of soldiers dragged her away towards their camps in the forests.

"Christ..." I muttered.

The chopper then turned it's attention towards the guardtower where Glenn and Maggie where. While the concrete structure stood up to the dozens of rounds aimed at it, they were so numerous and so pesky that all that the young couple could do was hide from the lead storm. They were pinned in there.

This allowed about a dozen of the surviving engineers to take on each guardtower unharassed. Little by little the other guardtower was torn apart, until final I saw Glenn jump off of the rails, and I didn't know if he'd survived the fall. It was dismal to watch, and it was dismal to watch Maggie follow suit. By this point, I had resigned to the inevitable as I slipped out and met up with Carl and Beth. Both of them were also distraught and had looked like they knew the near future. I didn't even bother checking if the prison was still in our hands. By the lack of gunfire I could already tell. And everywhere, men were cheering and swearing like it was their first time getting laid. I couldn't tell what exactly they were saying but I didn't need to. We'd lost.

"Carl..." I started.

"It's alright Daryl," said the kid. "They was no easy way out anyways."

I could tell Beth was going to say something as well, but she was cut off by the stomps of men coming from two directions. The surviving engineers on my left, the Governor's men on my right. No way out for certain. The three of us checked our ammo: enough for one last burst of mischief before the end.

"See you in Heaven," said Beth.

"Girl, we'll be seeing _everyone_," I said back. Then my attention turned to the engineers. "Alright big boys, tired of dick waving already? Come and have go at us if you think you can."

Both groups charged for us - for one second.

Then they stopped. I didn't immediately know why they did, but they kept training their weapons on us. I braced myself for a bullet to the skull any second now, but none came. Then I saw why the had stopped: another helicopter was on us with that damned machine gun. _Hold tight_, it was signifying, _or these boys will be cleaning you with a mop and bucket._

A familiar figure roped his way down from the chopper door, and walked towards us, passing by the last remaining engineers, who backed off respectfully.

"Hello, hello," said the all too familiar voice of authority. "And how is your babysitting going along?"

"Quite smashing," I said while the faces of Beth and Carl turned red. "And you?"

"Well, let's see," said the man. "This prison is all but ruined. The Governor and I appear to be the two leaders now. And Merle Dixon's biggest shadow has more guns trained on him than scars." Major Hanson took out his own gun and cocked it. "I'm just as happy as I can be."

"Where the fuck's the Governor?" I asked rudely. I was surprised that it was Hanson and not the former leader of Woodbury to handle me personally. "I really didn't know you were that much of his bitch." To which I got a kick in the nuts that hurt like holy hell.

"Mr. Blake is still recovering from his injuries," said Hanson. "He will want to talk with you about your method of execution when he is finished. In the meantime, I wanted to chat about your heroic defense. I went through all the troubles and hardships of trying to put together this fancy strike force. Knowing what I knew about Rick and you, I expected some serious opposition. Turns out I hardly needed anything. Talk about disappointment."

"Is the only thing you're going to do is gloat?" asked harshly. Another soldier attempted to punch me but Hanson ordered him to stop and listen. I continued. "Look Hanson, if you haven't noticed, no one here is in any position to harm you or your men any further. The decent thing would be to let them go, without weapons but with some supplies or something. Compassion, do you have it?"

He seemed astonished. "Why, do you take me for some kind of Gandhi or something? Let you all go?"

"Come on," I was getting desperate. "What else are you going to do with us? Mass execution?"

"I was considering it. Are you pleading for your life here, Mr. Dixon?"

"Not just mine. Everyone's."

He thought for a while. Finally he said "What if I offered you a price? I'll do what you're asking of me, but..."

"But what?"

"You join Michonne at the execution the Governor's got planned for her."

My throat was crackly-dry. My stomach felt like it had been constipated and stuck for a long time. A voice in my head was screaming again and again _NO!_

"Okay," I said.

The responses from the home crowd were mixed. I heard a sigh from Carl, and murmur of hope from another person, and surprise all around.

"Daryl, what are you doing?!" The one protest came from Hershel, who had been dragged here away from anyone he was looking after in the sickroom. "This man works with the Governor. I fear he's no better than that monster-"

"Oh, shut up, old man," Hanson wasn't even trying to argue. He even had two soldiers hold Hershel down much to the dismay of Beth, who went to his side. "I know what you're thinking, and rest assured, it will not happen. I possess far more honor and respect than Phillip. In fact, let's be men and shake hands on it. Deal?"

"Deal," I said half-heartedly, and took his cold, powerful hand into my own dirty fingers. When we were finished and done with it, one of the Governor's men came up to me with a knife pressed against my throat. I recognized this one, he was Allen, one of that small group of Tyreese's that Rick had sent away in his bout of insanity. Allen looked bitter and pleased with himself at the same time. "You're not going to go slowly, Dixon. Your brother killed my boy. I only hoped he was here to see me return the favor."

Hanson looked at him with interest. He could clearly see the burning passion and hate that the Governor had seen in him as well.

"You know what?" Hanson asked Allen, who looked up at him with curiosity. "You can have the job of official executor. You seem like a good person to fit that bill. Now Phillip's got some pretty nasty ideas, go and tell him to pick one for Daryl. I promise you, he will suffer.

Allen went off to preform that task. Then Hanson's attention turned to his men. "Secure whatever areas of this place that are not walker free, and haul the redneck's sorry ass in one of the cells. Make sure he's heavily guarded at all times. Same goes for the rest of these people. Individual cells, and guards everywhere. I'm not anticipating any last minute assassination attempts or anything, but you can never be too careful."

As one of them took me by the neck, I thought of something that needed to be said. "You'd better keep your promise, Hanson. Otherwise..."

"Otherwise what? You'll kill me? You've got nothing against me, not even your own shit. But don't worry. Unlike the Governor, I keep my promises, I already told you. Well, most of the time."

It was all the assurance I was going to get. But it was going to have to do.

* * *

The cell didn't bother me. Neither did Martinez and Allen lurking outside it. It was my mind doing flips in my head regarding my decision.

More than once the phrase _What the fuck are you doing Daryl?_ crossed my mind, but the decision I had made still seemed the logical one to make. No one else could have really struck that deal with Hanson like I did. No one had really pissed him off more than me or, rather, Rick, but he had been dead for days. So naturally I was the one to take all the punishment in his place. Just using the one bargaining tool I had left in the game - myself.

I racked my brains over and over, thinking stuff and things. It had to have been at least an hour. I knew I was about to die. Horribly, in some crude, terrible fashion. That was not for debate. But was there possibly some way to turn things around? Was there still a chance of redeeming the situation to some extent?

Eventually my mind decided it wanted to talk, and talk now. I began to pester the two men outside to bring the Governor to me then and now. Each of them suggested I do some very nasty and uncomfortable things. But I kept at it, and finally they sent someone to go and fetch the Governor and see if he was done with that bullet in his arm or something.

About half an hour from that, the Governor came down to my cell to have a private talk. His clothes were a disgusting mess, and his left arm was wrapped in some kind of bandage sling. This indicated that whoever shot him rescuing me had broken a bone or something. But what I took notice of most was the fact he didn't have his eye patch on. Either he lost it during the fight, or he purposely took it off afterwards.

His first words confirmed the latter. "Do you know why I have my eye patch removed, Dixon?" I remained silent. "So I can watch you and the black bitch die slowly and painfully with my own eyes." The good eye showed a hate and contempt that I had not seen in anyone else save my pa. "Are you going to beg for your life? Have any last minute death requests?"

"Actually I do." I was formulating a plan as soon as I heard those words about requests.

"Maybe if this prison was in the time before, on death row. But not now. Never."

"Honestly, I'm already going to die for your friends, in what I assume is going to be the most brutal and horrifying way to kill a man along with Michonne. Consider this my little fee."

"Your so-called 'fee' is the survival of everyone else in your group."

"Then I'm looking for a raise. It's really not that much. Do you still have a sense of honor or anything? At least hear me out."

The Governor turned away and whispered a few things to Martinez. Then he came back. "Well, Daryl, I'll listen. That doesn't mean I'm promising anything else, though."

That was all I needed. I briefly outlined my two simple requests.

The first brought a mildly confused frown and a murmur of "Well, ain't that cute." The second brought a malicious smile from the Governor.

"I'll see what I can do," he said as he left me.

**AN: What are Daryl's requests? Not telling, except that the first one involves some lovey-dovey time between Daryl and Beth.**

**-Jokerang**


	21. Confession From The Heart

_If our love_

_is tragedy why are you my remedy_

_If our love's_

_insanity why are you my clarity?_

_-_Zedd feat. Foxes, _Clarity_

* * *

Some time later, Martinez came to me saying one word: "Visitor."

He threw Beth into the cell, and I almost had to pick her up to put her back on her feet. It was also very awkward with both Martinez and Allen standing in the cell with us, weapons at the ready. One hell of a squash, it was. "Maybe we could have a little privacy or something, you feel me?"

"Orders," said Martinez. "Neither of you is allowed out of sight while you're together."

"Then just stand outside with your guns or something. You can even keep the cell door open."

Eventually they relented.

Beth and I just sat there on the bed, silent for a few minutes. Then all of a sudden she looked at me with those beautiful blue eyes and said, "Daryl, you're an idiot."

"Um, how so?" I was confused.

"How could you do something... something so-"

"Selfless, brave and noble? I know it's a surprise. But hey, it's Daryl Dixon you're talking to. I open my mouth, and half the time crap flies out faster than your eyes can handle, if that."

"Well, why di you do it? Why not anyone else? He already had Michonne, and that's who he hates the most. So why did you take the offer?"

"I dunno," I said. "I suppose it's because I'm the leader, by default. So it had to be me by default. Just one of those times where you get cut down because you stand up. But also..."

I thought hard. I'd been doing little but thinking hard ever since I'd been locked up in this cell.

"I probably should have died a long time ago. The quarry camp, the CDC, your dad's farm, all those months on the road, and so much more. Each and every time, I realized I was damn lucky. For reasons beyond my control, I kept getting seconds shots when too many others didn't. So everything since has been gravy, as far as I'm concerned. I've had fun, if that. These past few months have been intense, painful, baffling, sometimes even fucking awful - and I know it's been the same for you - but whatever. I've done things I never would've dreamed in a million years I'd be doing. I became a hunter in a world that badly needed them. I not only survived in a zombie apocalypse but thrived in it. I also fought a fight worth fighting. Nothing questionable about helping Rick and all that. This wasn't some spurious war cooked up by the government to keep the oil flowing or building contracts up and running. We were fighting an actual threat that needed to be stopped. Even though we failed, we didn't go down without a fight."

"So at least you've got something out of all this."

"Don't act like that."

"Act like what?"

"All pissy and twisted. I was going to say something else. One of the most amazing things I got out of this entire situation was meeting... well, you. When we first encountered at the farm, you were just a Southern belle in splendid isolation and I was just some redneck that was part of a group taking up your land. In any other circumstances, we never would've met. Same with Glenn and Maggie. Bear with me here, I'm not good at this shit. Even after all those nights together, I still don't know what you think of me. but I think you are pretty incredible. And also incredibly beautiful. And... well..."

I spotted Martinez making a bunch of stupid, leering faces right in front of me.

"Oh, fuck off, asshole," I snapped at him. "This is difficult without a cockface like you to come along and-"

"Concentrate on me, Daryl," said Beth, taking my hands with hers. "Ignore him."

I tried my goddamned best. "I'm a hard-shelled bastard. You know it, I know it, hell everyone does. I act like nothing bothers me most of the time. I cared about Merle, but that was about as far as inner feelings go. But you, Beth... I still can't get over the fact that you still chose me, out of anyone else in your meager list of options. There was Rick, there was Carl... nope, you chose me. And I'm not against sex for its own sake. Far from it, in fact. I... love you, Beth Greene, but if _you _feel something more, even a little spark or something, I need to know and I need to know now."

"No offense, but that's what you brought me here for?" Her eyes were almost watering up. "When you're just moments away from dying?"

"It's that close?"

"The 'audience' is gathering."

"Shit then. This is the perfect time for this then. When better? And give it to me straight from the heart. Not what you want me to hear, not what your dad or sister want to hear if they were here, but you. Your personal feelings. Is it possible for a teenage farm girl with the voice of an angel to love a brutal redneck such as myself? Is it possible for something between us? Can it happen?"

There was a pause. A long one. I used the time to just stare into that lovely face and all its features. Then she looked up and whispered, "Yes. Yes it can."

I sat back, finally contented. "Then I guess I can die happy now."

"Truly?"

I nodded. "I mean every word of it. Let's face it: for the first time in my life, I loved a girl and she loved me back. Doesn't get much better than that."

By this point Martinez and Allen were bombarding us with a shit ton of mocking 'ooh' and 'whoo' noises, though it hardly registered.

Beth said, "Are you sure you still want to go through with all this? If I could help you..." She slowly slipped a knife behind Martinez's back and handed it to me. I only silently gave it back to her. "No way. I'm no pussy, and besides, if I die right now, what's to stop Hanson from not carrying out his part of the deal to keep everyone else safe? I could use some words of encouragement though, if you have any."

She racked her brain. "Well, I don't know how religious your are, but there is one Bible quote I thought might give you strength. Phillippians 4:13 : _'I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.'_ So can you Daryl. I take back you being an idiot. You are so unselfish, and so so brave."

"Time's up," barked Martinez.

"Your boss promised us a half hour," I told him.

The Hispanic just shrugged his shoulders. "How the fuck an I supposed to know what an hour is anymore? I never used my watch since the world went to shit. Besides, I think your girlfriend's been here long enough. Time to say goodbye."

I muttered something uncomplimentary. Martinez and Allen just laughed.

"Daryl..."

Beth took my chin in her hand and guided my face to hers, and we kissed.

One of the few real kisses I ever gave someone. And my last.

Sweet, firm, and all but over all too soon.

But it would be one I would have remembered for all my life, even if I lived to be a ripe old age.

**AN: Short but sweet chapter. It's kind of a transition between two major parts of the story. Also, this is going to be my last chapter for a while, maybe three weeks. Due to personal reason, I won't be able to get on here as often as I usually do. I will try, but make no guarantees. **

**Also, once again, thanks to everyone who reviewed, favorited, or followed this story. It really means a lot to me.**

**-Jokerang**


	22. Punishment

**Warning: this chapter is going to be one of the darkest in the fanfic. You've been warned.**

* * *

My lips were still tingling from that kiss when Hanson and his guards came to collect me.

Outside, in one of the courtyards, they'd built some kind of platform out of wood. It was large, looked crude, but was sturdy-looking. Also, in addition to the platform itself, there were four wooden poles, each about five feet high. They made some kind of cross, with two of them about seven to eight feet from each other. Ropes were lying on the ground, waiting for use.

Everyone was waiting in front of it. Carol (holding Judith), Hershel, Carl, Beth of course, plus Whiz, Trapdoor, and the four or so remaining Woodbury people. I was placed next to Michonne, who was handcuffed and tied up. There were the Governor's men. Soldiers galore. Engineers. Some men who I took out to be helicopter pilots, out of their birds and looking quizzical and bloodthirsty - executions like this were obviously not an everyday occurrence, but something worth the watch nevertheless. And waiting on the platform were Allen, Martinez, a group of men in lab coats that more resembled butcher aprons (they reminded me of that Repo Man movie), and none other that the Governor himself. He had placed his eye patch back on and had a dark grey turncoat that created an intimidating appearance.

"Pleased you could make it!" he said with false joy.

"Yeah, I wish I could tell you the same," I replied.

"Oh come on now Daryl, don't be like that. For you and Michonne, this is the big day. In some strange way I feel you even want this. Oh wait, it is. An ego like yours couldn't just be satisfied with everyone else dying or you dying out there. It had to be big and entertaining, didn't it?"

"Well, what can I say? The Dixon family is filled with fame whores."

"And you must be the best of them. Quipping and wisecracking straight to the end. We'll see how easy it is to keep the jokes coming when we've got our little punishment going on you and Michonne. First, though, if my eyes don't deceive me, I think I see some last minute arrivals." Everyone followed his gaze to where he was looking at.

Glenn and Maggie had, to everyone's surprise, not died in that guardtower explosion, but rather had only been badly injured. A couple of soldiers held them on their knees, both struggling to stay upright as they were. They were in no mood to fight back, and they showed it. Both of them were very bloodied up, and their clothes were in tatters. Maggie had a black eye while one of Glenn's arms looked twisted and had a nasty bleeding at the elbow. The Governor looked at them with scorn and contempt. "Ah yes, the lovebirds," said the Governor. "Tired of fighting to keep yourselves together and continuing a lost cause? I thought as much."

"Don't... celebrate just yet... you bastard..." Glenn managed to get out of his throat.

"Why not? That's just sore loser talk. Now, let's not be distracted anymore from our order of business, which is plainly the deaths of Daryl and Michonne. Ready to get this over with, you two?"

"Fuck you," said Michonne.

I made a yes-and-no noise.

"I'll start with you Daryl. Allen, tie him up and have him ready. He'll be screaming in no time." Just as the man was about to begin, the Governor had a lighting bulb moment. He looked around, then at me.

"Wait one minute! It almost slipped my mind. Didn't I promise you two favors, Daryl?"

"I was wondering if you'd remember."

"You wanted to have a few last words with Beth, and what was the other one? no wait, I've got it. You asked if I would give up my 'inside person', assuming, of course I had one. That was it, wasn't it? Let you have him and let you decide what was to be done with him."

"Correct."

"Well, I said yes to your first favor, and I'm also inclined to say yes the other one as well, right now. Nothing makes me more satisfied that seeing one man getting his revenge on another who's done him wrong. Maybe it's because I'm used to so many betrayals in Woodbury. Story of my life, I'd say. So, you asked me to hand over the double-crosser, the one you reckoned was fucking up your plans and getting some of your friends killed. I asked you to describe him and I'd bring him up for you to see if you still thought he was the one. The result is... Martinez?"

The Governor's second in command looked at his boss.

"See that guy in the aviators and Falcons cap? Bring him here please."

Martinez went and fetched Whiz, who was aghast and dumbfounded, or so it looked. He was tossed onto the platform with me.

"Daryl, what the fuck is this?" said Whiz, shocked to the core. "What are you doing?!"

"Isn't it obvious, man? You screwed us all over, just like I said at Rick's funeral. I wanted to show you what I think of that. Worst crime of all - betraying your own side."

"But I didn't!"

"You're lying. You can deny it all you want, but I know."

But I don't know the Governor. Never saw him in my life until now. This is ridiculous, man. What do you want? I fought next to you. I put my balls on the line, just like you! I ain't a Judas!"

"You know, that's pretty convincing," said the Governor. "Swearing blind he ain't the one." To which I replied with "Well, he would know, wouldn't he?"

"Tell him," said Whiz, who was sounding desperate. "I never worked with you, and never had anything to do with you."

"Ain't down to me pal. This is Daryl's call."

"You're still the one," I said, convinced. "You're a sleazy bastard, and for that you're getting the same punishment as I am."

"Daryl..."

"Do him first," I said to the Governor. "Whatever you've got planned for me and Michonne, do it to him. I'll watch."

"Very well," said the one-eyed man, who turned to Allen. "This is your lucky day, son. You'll be doing three of them in all."

While Allen smiled to himself, Whiz continued to protest and scream. "No please, no!" he cried as the soldiers up on the platform began tying up first his arms, then his legs on the wooden poles, one extremity each. "This ain't right! This isn't fair! Please, for God's sake, Phillip, you can stop this. Help me!"

The Governor's shrug was a reply in itself. "If you're what Daryl claims to be, then you've outlived your usefulness to me. The game's over. What's one less player on the field going to do?"

Allen called for the other helpers to get something. They went to one of their walker vans and fetched four of them. Like most walkers, they were bloodied and hungery, but there was something about these that struck a chord. Then I realized it: these were the zombified remains of four of the Woodbury folks who had died defending our prison. As if adding insult to injury...

"There is," said the Governor, having to raise his voice thanks to Whiz's protests, "an old, ancient Chinese form of execution called slow slicing. The objective of this form of torture and then death was to maximize the amount of humiliation delivered to a person before death. Normally knifes would be used, but here we have walkers. They make excellent substitutes." I had no clue whatsoever as to what slow slicing was or what happened during it. Luckily, the Governor was happy to explain. "It's simple. The condemned person was killed using a knife. Methodically, over an extended period of time, parts of the body were removed. This was a public execution method used to threaten people. Here we've replaced the knifes with walkers. Each walker will start their feast on a different arm or leg, and will work it's way up to the chest and stomach. For all I know, four walkers might be overkill, and we might not need them. People can have either high or low tolerance of pain, so you never know. This is what we're going to do to our buddy Whiz, then our buddy Daryl and finally Michonne. And all you folks get to watch."

He turned to Allen. "Any time your team is ready now."

Allen had the other men position the four walkers on the four extremities. Whiz had gone limp. He hung from his ropes, breaths coming in fast, sharp pants. He was in shock. He couldn't believe what was about to happen to him Didn't want to. I could see it in his eyes - they were glazing over, his mind was going elsewhere. He as retreating inside himself, trying to escape the here and now, vanishing within. Wherever he went, though, however deep he went, he would never be quite lost enough.

And as that first walker began eating, it's yellow teeth chewing into arm muscle and shredding bone into pieces, I couldn't help but think that I was going to be next. In a few moments it would be my arms nearly severed and sprouting blood in five different directions, my calves bitten slowly and painfully, my body being sawed through, my chest wrenching helplessly, my throat hurling out those soul-searing shrieks and howls...

In the end, though, it turned out they didn't really need the last walker on the left leg. Austin 'Whiz' Bowden was dead far before that. His head was laying on the ground, his wrists having been cut off by teeth and showing chewed up bone matter everywhere. His chest and legs didn't look much better. Organs spilling out, and legs holding fast to the feet only by literal threads made of muscle and tissue. All four walkers were steeped in blood from the carnage, still looking hungry as ever. As the saying went: after an hour he'll still be hungry. "Clean this up," said the Governor to the assistants, who proceeded to take down and put aside the remains of Whiz and toss them over the platform's backside, disposing of the walkers as well and replacing them new ones, none who looked like anyone I knew in life. "Now, it's Daryl's turn."

**AN: Told you it was dark. Managed to find time in my schedule to get this one in. Note: major plot twist coming very very soon. Don't worry about Daryl, he won't die. As always, review! Maybe I'll find some more time in my schedule to post another chapter sometime.**

**-Jokerang**


	23. Nope, Not Him

After seeing the carnage that had just happened, every inch of me was screaming for me to escape now and save my life from the horror that was about to happen. However, that was no way of that happening, of course. I was tied up and surrounded by men who were dead set on killing me. Also, to save everyone else, I had to do this, even though I knew this already. The Governor was just smirking and smiling as if he was hiding a deadly secret from everyone and he was acting like he was keeping it safe and sound.

"There's act one folks," announced the Governor. "We just killed off someone who our friend Daryl here reckons was a traitor to his forsaken cause, and now he will be the next one to join him in that manner of death. Come on up and do a good job, if you will."

"You really think I'm in the position to do anything else, dipshit?" I had to dig deep to find this kind of opposition while this close to death.

The Governor chuckled. "Of course." He then walked around to position myself so that his head was upside down to mine. "Before you die, though, I just wanted to tell you one thing I though you'd like to know before going out."

"Which is?"

His good eye looked directly into one of mine. "You were definitely right about me having an inside man in your group. I like to think of him as a kind of mole - not the kind that goes underground to pass on secrets from on person to another, but the kind that digs holes for people to fall into with little hope of getting our soon."

"Yea, well what's the point of telling me something I already knew?"

The Governor looked into the crowds, then back at me. "You thought it was that guy named Whiz, right?"

"Yea..." I had really bad feeling about this, but did my best to keep it hidden.

"Well..." The way the Governor said that one word confirmed my worst fears.

"Wasn't him."

I was in shock, denial and anger. There was no way it was possible. I was certain I had him.

"You're lying," I said quickly. "You're trying to make me feel bad about myself, to make me feel guilty."

"So you've convinced yourself," said the Governor, "even when you're wrong. Just as that guy said - never saw him before in my life. You were so certain you had your man, I really didn't have the heart to try and stop you. Besides, it was more fun letting go about like a chicken with its head cut off, seeing how far you'd go. And you really pushed the limits. My God Daryl, you're one cold-hearted son of a bitch. Anyone who gets in your way, they better watch out or they're going to end up like this poor fellow. You've got every inch of Merle's blood running through you. Got no qualms of terminating those who give you supposed slights with extreme prejudice. None at all."

The Governor grabbed an inch of my hair and yanked it hard, but didn't quite pull it all the way out either.

"I've gotta say, Daryl, those personality traits of yours, combined with that physique, could make any girl from my college days drooling and dropping their pants for you, boy. I can see what that Beth girl saw in you."

"I still don't believe you. It was Whiz, it fucking was. This is bullshit, you're trying to trick me."

"Well folks," said the one-eyed man, "this had got to be the hardest skull I'd ever encountered. I said it before, and I'll say it again: I never saw Whiz in my life. Ever."

"But..."

"This has got to be the most enjoyable part, watching you squirm there. It's like the steak sauce I put on my beef. You just let an innocent man die in one of the most obscene, horrible, and nasty ways there was, and you liked it. And to think everyone here accuses me of committing crimes against humanity when I shot up my Woodbury army. Not to get all Dr. Phil on you, but tell me, how _does_ that make you feel?"

Appalled. Gutted. Shattered.

Livid.

"YOU FUCKING PIECE OF DOG SHIT!" I roared at him. "You could have said at any time!"

"And why would I do that, when I could clearly enjoy this moment and string you along to have this minute of exquisite torment? You know, there's an interesting thing about psychological pain. While it's far harder to inflict that physical pain, it's far harder to bear and far more rewarding to inflict."

I made an effort to lunge for the Governor, that lying fucker. But my arms and legs were all tied up and unable to do anything but struggle. A number of the bad guys just laughed.

"Oh, none of that now," said the Governor, again using that fake charisma. "I'm not the one that got that poor man killed, you are. If anyone, you only have to blam yourself."

"Who was it, then?" I gasped. "Who's the traitor?"

"Haven't you figured it out by now?"

I had an inkling. I had an idea who it was. But I trusted him. I even almost considered him and friend and confidante.

"He's standing right over there," said the Governor, pointing somewhere in the crowd. "Looking kind of shift, but that's what he was here for. You know who you are, my friend. Rest assured, I won't touch you. No one will. I doesn't matter who you are or what you did. It doesn't matter what these people think of you now. You're one of my most trusted men, and are under my watch. In fact, why don't you come on up the stage and take a bow? You've done excellent work, as far as I'm concerned, and deserve a moment of glory."

The man he was referring to slowly but surely broke from the crowd, amidst the disgusted looks of the original group of mine, walked briskly past the soldiers, and took to the stairs with a confident gait.

He paused in the middle of the platform, where his boss with the eye patch offered a friendly and conspiratorial hand. "Sup, bro," said Trapdoor, with a twinkle in his eye as he spoke. "How's it hanging?"

**AN: Don't you just hate the Governor? Another shorter update, I'm still able to do them till about the 14th, and then I'll be gone till the 28th. When I get back, I promise to resume this ASAP.**

**-Jokerang**


	24. The Traitor

"Yes, I was the one fucking with your operations all this time, not Whiz," said Trapdoor, smirking all the way. "Me, the man with the most military experience. I know it's a skill badly needed, so I counted on that to keep me in. Just because someone's extremely valuable doesn't mean he's above suspicion. Anyways, what I am. The Governor over here employed me to be a sort of agitator. How'd you put it Phillip?"

"A destabilizing influence."

"Yeah, exactly, destabilizing. Sow a little uncertainty over here, start small bits of infighting right there. Do everything I could to make the Governor's victory all the more likely. It wasn't exactly the challenge to get in in the first place. You guys had a lack of decent fighters, given that half of them were recently acquired older folks and kids, and Rick was just grateful to have a warm body with merc experience. Not hard at all. The real job of mine, once I'd gotten in, was to start making friends, gaining the influence of the leaders, and find the right head to keep shaking."

"If the head's unstable, the whole body wobbles in response," chipped in the Governor.

"Me," I said. "I was that head."

"Got it in one," responded Trapdoor. "No way in hell I was going to try for Rick himself. Too distant and too remote a target. Hard enough to gain his influence, even harder to manipulate him when possible. Only people he ever trusted were the original members of his group, the one he had before he got the prison. So I started with Hershel. I spent quite some time talking to the old man, discussing things like religion, long-term strategy for the group, farming plans, and so on. I had his influence, but the problem was, he had only one leg. He wasn't going out on any runs or defending the prison on his legs. Then I started on you. You were perfect. You weren't exactly best friends with everyone, but we all knew that you were Rick's second in command. You didn't need to go places, you were already there. Plus, we had similar backgrounds. We both came from abusive homes were little was expected of us, and we both had pre-apocalypse lifestyles that made us ready to thrive in Zombieland. We had a friendship running. You were the perfect mark."

"More like the perfect fool," I said.

"Oh, whatever. Look, do you really want me to spill the beans and tell ya how it all went down? Because I feel like I'm monologuing here, and I know you've got way more important things that need to get done to you."

I was about to tell him I wasn't interested in hearing out what he had to say because I had no desire to listen to anything more that came out of his fucking lying mouth. But then I spotted something out of the corner of my eye.

Movement. On one of the ruined guardtowers. A figure making stiff, halting progress on the damaged roof there, searching for a vantage point.

A woman with a rifle.

I directed my gaze back to Trapdoor. Kept my expression as straight as possible. Poker face on.

"Oh no, go right ahead," I said. "Tell me everything. I know you're dying to. Explain to everyone how clever you've been and how stupid I am."

"Do we really have to do this?" asked one of the executioner assistants with a sigh. "The day's wasting and I would really like to get this over with."

"Just a few more minutes," said the Governor. "My boy here hoodwinked our enemies in good style, and he deserves his chance to gloat."

"Yeah," Trapdoor agreed. "So why not? I made myself the sidekick of the supply runs, whether it was you or Rick. Robin to Batman and such. We had those chats about my childhood and my Blackwater days, and how my poor army buddies got their heads cut off by Islamists. That, by the way, is all true. I did empathize the parts about torture and abuse under my parents, but the basic story's all real."

"I know one mistake you made," I said, trying to buy time for that unknown sniper on the guardtower.

"Which is?"

"You referred to the Governor as Phillip without any of us telling you. That should have rang a bell in our heads. Only people who knew the Governor personally knew that his first name was Phillip."

I dared to glance back at the watchtower. The woman with the rifle was settling down in a flattish position, almost prone. As far as I knew, I was the only one who knew she was there. The whole crowd of onlookers was focused on the stage, listening to the drama unfolding there. And the platform people were looking at me and Trapdoor. How long this was going to continue was unknown, but I was determined to delay as long as possible. I now recognized the woman from the hairdo she had and the bandage on her head.

Sasha.

Risen from her sickbed. Recovered from the injuries and coma she'd suffered during the tank attack, and now she was back for revenge. Apparently, she'd been overlooked. Hanson and/or the Governor had decided that she'd be out for the duration and had not bothered to post a guard or they had and she'd taken care of him one way or another. It was an oversight, and one that Sasha would make those bastards regret.

"Okay, maybe I did slip up there," said Trapdoor. "But in just about every other aspect I was flawless. All I had to do now was to find something to mess up. Starting that little fuck-up in Fort Benning was my first real big win. Karen died, and all your plans for an alliance with them was sent down the toilet. A shame really, Karen was really hot."

"That hot woman almost got you killed along with the rest of us there."

"Yeah, I knew that risk," said Trapdoor. "But I had something that could get me out of there in a quickie. Remember, I'm an army man. I still have dogtags from my old Iraq days, and I'm pretty sure that someone in the base would at least give another soldier a second chance. That was my potential Get Out of Jail Free card. Only, I didn't need to try to use it because Jay showed up out of nowhere to save our asses. From there, Karen's death started the rot amongst y'all. You were rattled, and the others and Rick began to go around and doubt each other and all that. The next thing I did was cut all those fences and do my best to let walkers in. That cost bullets and made everyone pissy and tired. Now I gnawed at the others and probed them to find someone to really screw with. Poor Whiz was simply the easiest to get a rise out of. He was a closet racist. I know the types. Very easy to root out. I know he'd blurt out nasty things eventually and it'd drive wedges between him and the other leading members of the prison survivors. You already had him in the frame of things for what happened to Karen and the Fort Benning incident. Now, with the fact he was sleeping outside with the broken fences and the arguments he started, you were completely convinced that he was the bad banana in the bunch. It also meant you were constantly looking over your shoulder, and weren't 100% focused on the game."

My arms and legs were beginning to ache from carrying the weight of my body, suspended only by ropes. My head was also aching, with the revelation of how Trapdoor played us and used us. He'd get his, that cunt. Meanwhile, I also dared to check on Sasha. She was searching her sight for a good, non-moving target. I hoped she was as good a shot as I was. I had a feeling that she might be.

"Jay dying that night with the tank, that was just luck," continued Trapdoor. "As I suspected, you'd blame Whiz for something that he hadn't even done and make yourself look like the biggest idiot in the prison. Made you appear to be quite a shallow-headed leader. Whiz never did anything wrong. How he said things went were all correct. An accident. Causality of war."

"And Bruce. Your argument with him. You weren't trying to talk him out of desertion, you were talking him_ into_ it."

"Someone give the man a medal. Bruce was in two minds about quitting when he approached me. He wanted the opinion of a leader. Wanted a reason to stay. He was very surprised when I told him that I thought bailing out might be a good idea."

"But he left angry at you."

"Only because I wouldn't desert with him. I told him I respected you too much to leave you in your time of need."

"Ha, ha. So it was you all along. I could fucking kick you in the nuts."

"Yeah, if your legs weren't all tied up."

"Oh, don't be mad Daryl," added in the Governor. "Your group has a history of being blind to treachery in it's midst and being unable to deal with it/ Take Rick. He never knew his best friend was fucking his wife behind his back till she was pregnant and he could have killed me at that food store. It was a risk I took, but it paid off nicely. He had too many morals to deal with the threat right next to him."

"Plus," said Trapdoor, "it seems I have a knack for fooling others and subversion."

"The Governor nodded in agreement. "Yeah. I wish I could say that I taught Trapdoor everything he knows about fifth column work and being the brown nose in the pack, but I can't. This guy's a natural. Whatever Blackwater told him about spying and sneaking into other places really paid off. Soon as I found him I knew he was the man for the job."

"How _did_ you find him?" I asked. "Want ad? Open audition?"

"It wasn't hard, really. I seem to have a talent for finding shifty and brutal guys for my operations. My gang's full of them, I can tell you that. But back to the actual merc here. I had just taken over another group of about eight folks when I began sizing up the men for use. I had this feeling that one of them could prove to be so much more than just an enforcer. I had Martinez take him to one side, and the rest is history."

"Did he offer you anything?" I asked Trapdoor.

"Of course. Weapons, ammo and power. What else is there to fight and live for other than power. I have big plans for how to reclaim the rest of the state, and the Governor and Hanson will be glad to help out. This power will mean I'm on top of the world, power that makes be better than those Muslim bastards that gave me this." He gestured to a nasty scar on his neck. " I'll finally have the free will to do anything without the U.N. or government from breathing on my back, and I'll be able to do anything without everyone assuming I'm some white trash nobody who went into the army and merc business because he had no future anywhere else. The hobo from Nashville, restarting life in the end of the world as a player and manipulator."

"A Lieutenant General's rank as well, don't forget that," added Hanson.

"That too. For when the army's reinstated, I'll be able to rule for once."

"But it's on a foundation of blood," I said. "You'll never be able to enjoy it."

"Who the fuck are you to judge me, redneck?"

"Yeah, that's it. I'm a good for nothing redneck. You're a bottom feeding scumbag. There_ is_ a difference."

"Yeah, I'm a scumbag who's standing on the winning side and living, while you there redneck, are about to have your fucking arms and legs ripped off. So much for morals and such. I say let's get this over with."

"Finally!" said the assistant who had bickered earlier. "Isn't it about time we got this started already?"

"Sergeant Woods does have a point," said the Governor. "As much fun as this gloating and stuff, I really need this done with. There's folks standing out there that want this to be settled with."

_Come on, Sasha, get a bloody triggerfinger already._

"Not the chatterbox you've been, Daryl?" said the Governor. "Might as well say your last words now. Anything to say?"

"Yea," I said. "Don't miss, Sasha." I didn't say that part out loud.

The bad guys looked around in confusion, with Allen finally dawning on what I meant and looked up in alarm. Then, a bullet, and the man didn't have a forehead anymore.

**AN: My college summer camp begins today. Don't expect an update till the 28th or so. Once again, bing thanks to all the favorites/follows/reviews.**

**-Jokerang**


	25. Turn of Tide

Everything happened so quickly after that.

Even before Allen's body hit the floor, Sasha let off another bullet. This shot served a dual purpose. It first hit the Governor in the chest, who went down with a thud, and also banged off the lock to the walker trailer as well. Before anyone had their shit together, walkers were coming out and attacking several unsuspecting guards, and also causing others to fire, which in this case, only attracted more zombies. At the same time, I managed, with some struggle, to get one of the arm rope restraints off, ripped from the wooden pole it was attached to.

There was confusion all around. I saw three guards at the back of the area go down from rifle fire, and it wasn't Sasha's. There had to be a second sniper somewhere, working with her. Working on that optimism, I began to work of getting the other restraints off ASAP. The goons and soldiers were yelling, babbling. Stunned expressions everywhere. Was the Governor really dead. Where the walkers going to get them? They couldn't believe any of it.

Sasha saved me the trouble of getting the last leg restraint off and I looked around. The prison group couldn't believe it either. I sensed and saw a sudden surge of astonished delight from within the crowd. Then Glenn suddenly and quickly stood up, groin kicked the man still watching him, sending that thug to the ground. Before the man holding Maggie could retaliate, Glenn, in one fell swoop, took the rifle the first soldier was clutching and delivered two clean headshots. Sasha covered the couple as they frisked the dead men for weapons and ammo and handed it out to the rest of my group and began to get them to strike back. They had an opening, and window of opportunity. If there was ever a time for violent uprising, now was it.

Success! I got the final knot off!

Then a figure came from behind me and attempted to strangle me by choking my neck. I fought off my assailant and flipped him over to see who he was. Martinez. He got up faster then I would have expected and gave a sharp uppercut that would have knocked off a few teeth had I not twisted my neck at an awkward angle just a second before. I responded in kind by grabbing his wrist and yanking it as hard as I could, bringing the rest of him towards me. There, I grabbed Martinez's face, with him cursing and protesting all along, and scratched it pretty hard. He tried a knee-jab at my crotch but I managed to take it and threw him off the platform. I spotted a discarded machete and picked it up, with all sorts of ideas coming to mind. As I slowly approached Martinez, he began to beg for his life.

"Come on man," he groaned. "I can help you! I didn't like the Governor either! I only stayed with him cause anything else meant death or-"

I plunged the machete blade deep in his head, silencing him forever. I wasn't taking any chances. I'd already been duped once and I wasn't intending on experiencing the same thing again. Then something kicked my legs hard and brought me down.

I looked. The Governor might have been shot, and he might have been bleeding, but that didn't mean he was dead. In fact, he still had a bunch of fighting spirit in him. If he was going to die, he was going to kill me first.

"Always have to do the deed myself," he said as he followed his kick with another one intended for my shoulder. Not a second after it hit me did a bullet plunge itself into the platform and send splinters all around. Whoever sent it had no doubt been aiming for the Governor, but now that the target was moving aim wasn't so accurate anymore. At least the shot made the Governor hesitate a little, at least. Briefly, I roused myself. _Shift your ass, Daryl. _I sprang to my feet, carrying the machete, using the momentum of the action to carry the blade forward. The Governor just stared at it and looked up.

He was silent, although his face showed nothing but contempt and hate.

I contemplated the ways he could die. It only took a few seconds to decide his fate.

"Merle," I said roughly as I took the blade and severed my enemy's right arm at the elbow joint, resembling Merle's own severed arm. The Governor cried out a few words of pain, but pulled himself together and used his other hand to clutch the wound. "Maggie," I said as I proceeded to now use the machete and plunge it up the Governor's genitals. More curses and words of pain. Although I didn't know exactly what the Governor had done to Maggie, I was sure she would want his gonads on a pike before he died. Even though she wasn't here to watch it, I was sure she'd be satisfied.

"Now," I said with glee, "This last thing is for me-"

But before I could go ahead and give a good neck stab, another blade entered the Governor's other eye, sending blood and brain matter all around as the blade came back up. I searched and followed it to see who it was. It was Michonne. Somehow she'd also gotten out of her restraints and had found her katana among the chaos. "I was the one he truly wanted," she said, "and I feel I deserved that."

She went off to join the battle.

The Governor was truly dead. The man who we'd been fighting and wishing so many vile things to come upon was finally done for. I took one last look at the decimated corpse before taking my mind off of him.

* * *

A quick assessment of the rest of the ruined prison showed me that things were going fairly well for us. Encouraged by Glenn and Maggie, our lot was getting their hands dirty taking out as many of the enemy as we could. Guns and blades were being grabbed from stockpiles placed earlier and turned on their former owners. Walkers did fine as well, since most of them were making meals of hapless soldiers or Governor goons rather than us, who were fewer in number. It also helped a lot that the opposition was undoubtedly leaderless now, with the Governor scratched off the score card and Major Hanson nowhere to be seen. All at once there was no one to rally them, no one to inspire them. Too many unexpected events were happening in one time. The reversal in fortune was cumulative, like a volcano, gaining impetus as it went.

A few of the Governor's men, realizing that fighting was a lost cause, decided for the survival card, began to flee the scene, either on foot into the woods or in a vehicle of some kind. When others saw this, they too followed, and we picked those that we wanted to off with ease. Soon it was a mass exodus, a stampede into the forest. A few of the enemy stood their ground bravely, but were doomed from the moment they made their decision. Glenn and/or the walkers swarmed over them. Sasha helped with what she could, picking off soldiers and walkers here and there. Soon an entire courtyard was clear.

Finally Major Hanson appeared. He saw just as well I could who was winning and who was getting their ass kicked. After a failed attempt to put together what he could of his forces, he and about a dozen or so men began to run into the ruins of the prison. Among them was a very noticeable Robert Downey Jr. lookalike.

The blackness in my snarled. His name was Gideon Braddock. He was a former Blackwater operative.

And his nickname was Trapdoor.

I jumped off the platform, nearly stepping on the remains of the Governor. Maybe Merle hadn't been able to kill him off, but our efforts certainty had. As I approached the entrance the bad guys had just gone in, I saw from the corner of my eye a car zoom next to me. I could hear Carol's voice, telling me to get in, that we needed to leave as soon as I could. I ignored her and headed inside. There was more unfinished business to be handled.

I was inside. There was me, Major Hanson, a dozen of his troops, and an unknown number of walkers. They, however, could live or die. Whichever way, I didn't give a shit.

It was just me and Trapdoor now. I was going to find him, kill him, and gut him, and God help any bastard who got in my way.

**AN: Told you I'd be back. All the same.**

**Also, as we're reaching the endgame, I'd like to say I'm working on a sequel with Daryl, Beth, and whoever survives. Leave in a review who you'd like to see in the sequel, whether it be existing characters or new ones or OCs.**

**-Jokerang**


	26. Finale For Now

I started my search in Cell Block C. It was fairly intact despite the battle and was the most logical place to start. After that, I headed down to the tombs.

By that point I'd already run into a number of the bad guys. I couldn't exactly recall or retell what happen during these confrontations. All I knew was that my machete was slowly turning a dark red color that covered the silver shine with each fight.

Entering the tombs, I first made a mental note of where the alarm controls were before heading further in. I was going to prepare a little surprise all of them first. I pulled it and off the red sirens went. I also listened for footsteps and walker groans. I heard both and followed the former.

I found myself in one of the many shadows, watching over a group of five soldiers arguing and yelling among themselves. One of them - clearly Major Hanson - was insisting that the others find a way out and blast and kill all opposition with deadly force. Two helicopter pilots clearly disagreed. They thought the best option now was to escape in one of the helicopters and fly all the way back to Fort Benning. They had the gas and ammo needed to get back safely and sound. The little group wasn't coming to any conclusion.

This was a sure sign that things were breaking down for Hanson. He was no longer maintaining his authority any longer.

Not that it was going to matter for him in a few seconds.

Working from the shadows, I took the machete and in one fell swoop slashed off Hanson's head as fast as I could. He never saw me coming, that pathetic fucker. An engineer went next, stabbed in the heart. By this point the two pilots saw me, knew what I was here for, and realized they were in the shit, and decided to go down one of the alleys, even though there were walkers everywhere in it. Maybe they though I would be too cowardly to brave the walkers to get them. Maybe they thought they could reach their nice warm chopper in time for an escape.

When I was finished cleaning out the alley, I grabbed the fifth man and shook him as much as I could. He looked young, and was possibly some kind of aide to Hanson or something.

"Where's Trapdoor?!" I asked angrily and forcefully.

"W-Who's that?" asked the guy, very unstably.

"Iron-Man lookalike. Where is he? Where did he go?"

"I d-don't know. He split up from us and we assumed-"

I snapped his neck. There was nothing more that could be gotten out from him. Trapdoor and I were now playing a game of cat and mouse with each other.

"Sonofabitch," I muttered to myself.

WHAM! Something hit the side of my head, and I fell to one knee, grabbing the wound and cursing in pain. This was followed by a blow to my back which sent me fully to the ground, very painfully. Then I was turned over, and the guns in my belt discarded and tossed aside with a loud noise. My eyes took a couple of seconds to open up fully and see who it was with an M1 Garand in his hand.

"Still been itching to have a proper go with you," said Trapdoor, bloodied up and rage in his face. "Still gotta prove I'm the better man, even if you're the only one to see it."

"Jury's still out on that one," I said as I delivered the nastiest punch I could muster straight towards his left eye. Trapdoor moved back, gritting his teeth and clutching his new black eye. I used the time to stand myself up and knock out that single-shot rifle just in time for the triggerfinger to send the bullet into some wall instead of my arm. Trapdoor and I then got engaged in some crude form of arm wrestling, each of us desperately trying to find some way to break the other by any means. We were evenly matched. I was the bigger and stronger of the two, and thus put more pressure into the struggle, but Trapdoor made up for it in other ways. His legs were fast and consistently delivered kicks and knee-jabs every five seconds, and he was also faster than I was, as he kept attempting to pull me into some wall or cell door where he could use his abilities to his full advantage.

After some time, he finally got the opening he was fighting for. He did a very hard twist of my left wrist, sending into a very awkward position. I had no choice but to roar in agony. Trapdoor didn't let up. He gave a series of brutal punches and kicks as I reeled from the wrist strain. By the time it was recovered, I was on my knees, as Trapdoor looked at me almost in pity, although I knew it was false as his support for us had been.

"Still don't wanna live? All ya gotta do is tell me I'm so much better than you, and you're free to go. I'm being honest this time."

Bullshit. Bullshit all the way.

"NO" I roared as I pushed him with the little bit of energy I had left in my body. Trapdoor reeled quite a bit, surprised that I could still pack such a punch in the condition I was in.

"YOU got Karen killed!" I roared at him. I was going to shove his shit down his own face if that was what it took.

"Yeah, so?" said Trapdoor.

"YOU got Bruce killed!" I also swung him around while screaming that. All part of a good ol' beatdown. "And most importantly, YOU were the one that killed Whiz. You set him up!"

"Yeah, but you said it was alright for him to-"

"But you know what?" I said to Trapdoor, finally satisfied I had found a way to outsmart him. "His death served another purpose. It brought time for Sasha to set herself up and ready to snipe." I then pulled out another secondary knife. "If he hadn't have died, there would be no way I would be able to stick _this_ up your-"

I was pulled from the back by strong hands that were accompanied with a growl. A walker had gotten a hold of me, forcing me to drop the knife. This released Trapdoor from my own hands. He got up and sprinted up of into the distance, not looking back the entire.

As much as I wanted to kill that son of a bitch, I still had this walker to deal with. It's teeth were mere inches from my neck. Once again, my strength was wearing thin, but it was enough. It _had_ to be enough. Eventually, it reeled back from my pressure, and I gave it a good stab in the head to keep it down. No sooner was that one taken care of did another walker emerge from the tombs. It was just about to make a meal of me when it's head exploded in a fiery glob of blood and skull bits. I looked to see who me savior was. It was a black man whom I'd never seen in my life before. He had his rifle on me and was about to pull the trigger when Carl ran in the area and got in his way.

"Don't shoot him Morgan! He's not a bad guy! He's one of our best guys!"

The black man stared at me for a full second, then lowered his weapon.

"You're lucky," he said as the three of us headed back out to access the damage done in the past eight hours.

* * *

Morgan, or so he was called, had a long story to tell. When the outbreak first occurred, he'd fortified his house with his son, while his hapless wife had died and turned fast. They kept their place running, and eventually found Rick when the sheriff got out of a coma. After sending Rick on his way, that was the last the two men would meet for a while.

Then, one day in the winter months, the walker that was once his own wife bit his son. Morgan had no choice to kill that thing and his own son as well. Ever since, he'd been, according to Carl, losing it. By that time he'd fortified a whole street in King's County and proceeded to make it one big death trap. He created stakes, animal cages with rats, booby traps, and anything else to keep out the rest of the world while he was grieving. If a walker came along, he shot it. If a human had the misfortune of assuming that he was offering sanctity, they were wrong. Morgan would kill them as if they were a walker, strip them of anything valuable, and use the corpses for more walker traps.

But then, a visit from Rick, Carl and Michonne changed things. Morgan attempted to attack them at first, but they got the upper hand on him and secured him to question him. Turns out he was still mad and still raving at life, and even tried to kill Rick again. It took Rick all of his talking and people skills to calm him down and try to knock some reason into him. Morgan didn't come back to the prison of course, but he did give us the majority of our guns and ammo. The rest of us assumed he was just going to stay there till he died. Not for long. Turns out that some of Hanson's men came to inspect the area on the way to our place. When Morgan refused them entry through, the soldiers simply responded by opening fire. Morgan killed as many of them as he could, but the sheer numbers were just overwhelming. He barely escaped with his life, and decided that the prison was his best bet. Or so he thought.

* * *

"So, what's the damage level?"

Glenn looked at me like I was a village idiot trying to tell him to tie his shoes.

"Can't you see? This place is _gone_, every trace of what we could rebuild done for-"

"Yeah, but Cell block C's intact, we could start there and-"

"And what? Every other block is wrecked to bits. All our weapons were taken after we were captured and held while waiting for you to die. Only weapons we have are low on ammo and we don't have a lot of them. And we're missing a whole lot of people."

"What do you mean?" I wanted to know who was here and who was not.

Glenn just shook his head.

"Where's Sasha?"

Glenn looked down. "Dead. Grabbed by a walker and bit just seconds before you entered the prison. Nothing we could do, she shot herself to prevent the process."

I nodded. I didn't really know her, but she had been a good fighter and didn't deserve that. "Carol?"

" Got in a car. Escaped with Judith in the chaos, trying to outrun a horde. Dunno if we'll find them or even see her again." This news hurt even more than Sasha's death had, or anyone's for that matter. Carol had been my best friend for months, and we knew each other better than anyone else. I prayed she was still alive somewhere, along with little asskicker. "Michonne?"

"She left us. Not dead, but just sort of... left. She said it was best if we parted ways. Didn't say why or where she was going." I was getting more upset by the minute. Michonne was - had been - one of our best fighters, and we still didn't know her good enough to see when she would leave us without warning. "Hershel or the rest of the Woodbury folks?"

"The old man's disappeared, no sight of him but no body either. The Woodbury people all died fighting the soldiers. Not many left of the soldiers left by the way. Only found six, and they all agreed to stop fighting if they could return to their fort unharmed. One of them tried to double-cross us nad he didn't get very far."

"Good for you, I don't like liars. Now, Trapdoor's still out there somewhere, so watch your back." After Trapdoor, I doubted everything and feared betrayal at every turn. I looked to see who was left here and now. Five of us: Carl, Glenn, Maggie, Beth and myself, six if you counted Morgan. That was all there was. No safe haven, no real plan, very few weapons and ammo... but enough hope to go around. A small amount of hope after today, but some nevertheless.

We loaded up the vehicles one last time in that place, hoping that we could find a better sanctity up north somewhere. Morgan had heard rumors from a hitchhiker that Knoxville or somewhere in the area had been turned into a 'sanctum' of sorts. After searching what we could in Georgia already, we'd found that the state had pretty much been stripped or walker-infested. North was our best bet. Everything was almost ready to go.

But first, there was one last thing to do.

* * *

I found Beth sitting in front of the graveyard. She was just sitting, silent, her weapons put aside and a blank expression on her face. She turned around as I approached her. She didn't say anything, but telling from her body language she wanted me to join her. So I did.

We sat there in quietness for several minutes, contemplating the graveyard and everyone in it. Amy, Jim, Sophia, Otis, Jimmy, Patricia, Dale and the Greene family were remembered in absence. T-Dog, Merle, Andrea, Karen, Lori and Rick were physically here, and every one of their deaths had taken a toll on the prison. There were even crosses for Dr. Jenner, Shane, Milton, and the Woodbury attackers killed by the Governor. They had all been opposing forces at one time or another, and in another reality I'd have killed them all, but at their cores they were all good people and the prison story wouldn't be the same without them.

And now there would be more bodies to go around, but we couldn't do anything with them.

Beth then poked me.

"You think this is the best thing to do?"

"Leaving the prison?"

"Of course. It was the safest place we've had for a long time, and we can't just leave it and not expect to feel... let down." She looked disappointed and fearful.

"We've got no choice," I told her. "It's been too badly beat up in the battle, and there's no way we can repair it without something or someone attacking us while we do that. It's for the best."

"It's a good place though."

"And too many bad memories as well. We'll just have to move on. Everyone's gotta."

I wrapped an arm around her, and she did the same.

"I love you Daryl," she said to me.

"You don't need to tell me that. I already know," I replied as I kissed her softly and lovingly. She smiled at me.

And we sat there, comforting each other, watching an episode of our lives die slowly. We got in our vehicles: Maggie and Glenn in a 2001 CRV, Morgan took Carl in an armored van, and I had Beth on my back as I led the way with Merle's motorbike. All of us took one last look at the West Georgia Correctional Facility as it slowly faded in the distance and from our memories. For now.

**The End... for the time being**

**AN: I want to thank first all the fans of this fanfic. Without you, this story wouldn't exist.**

**As I already mentioned, I'm planning a sequel, so be excited. Trapdoor will return, as will some of those who have gone missing in this epilogue. A certain sadist who uses a baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire will also appear. Other than that, all bets are off, so feel free to message me story ideas.**

**Message me your OCs, I'll need plenty of them for the sequel.**

**All the best,**

**-Jokerang**


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